DeYtH

Banger

Brain on Porn (Social #2)

Brain on Porn (Social #2)

Brain on Porn (Social #2)

by DeYtH Banger
Content

1. Facts
2. Quotes



Part 1

Chapter 1 - Why?
Chapter 2 - Just
Chapter 3 - Happiness
Chapter 4 - Anxiety
Chapter 4.1 - Anxiety
Chapter 4.2 - You Want Confidence
Chapter 5 - I am Innocent
Chapter 6 - Strategy

Part 2

Chapter 7 - IBC
Chapter 8 - Try
Chapter 9 - InsiGHT
Chapter 10 - The Secret (Part 1)
Chapter 10.2 - The Secret (Part 2)
Chapter 11 - Anxiety (Higher Levels)
Chapter 12 - GostTrellegy (Stories)
Chapter 12.1 - Anxiety (Higher Levels)
Chapter 13 - Wow Effect
Chapter 14 - Social is Addiction
Chapter 14.1 - Insight

Part 3


Chapter 1 - Truth
Chapter 1.1 - Insight
Chapter 2 - Lets Face It
Chapter 2.1 - Insight
Chapter 3 - Let's Face It (Part 2)
Chapter 4 - Let's Face It (Part 3)
Chapter 5 - You got Mind Fucked
Chapter 6 - Mind Fucked
Facts

Depression can cause you to dream up to 3 to 4 times morethan

you normally would.
Severe Depression can cause us to biologically age more by
increasing the aging process in cells.
1 in 8 adolescents in the U.S. have clinical depression.
Research conducted on comedians and funny people have shown
they are usually more depressed than average.
10 times more peoplesuffer frommajor depressionnow than in
1945.
People who spend a lot of time on the internet are more likely to
be depressed, lonely and mentally unstable, a study found.
Iceland is very depressed: it has the world's highest rate of
antidepressant use.
1 in 5 people in France
has experienced depressionmaking it the most depressed
country in the world.
Sigmund Freud recommended Cocaineas treatment for
depression, alcoholism, and morphine addiction.
Gratitude can boost dopamineand serotonin, just like
antidepressants.

Quotes

"What fascinates me about addiction and obsessive behavior is

that people would choose an altered state of consciousness that's
toxic and ostensibly destroys most aspects of your normal life,
because for a brief moment you feel okay."
Moby

"Smoking sucks! The one thing I would say to my kid is, 'It's not
just that it's bad for you. Do you want to spend the rest of your life
fighting a stupid addiction to a stupid thing that doesn't even really
give you a good buzz?'"
Katherine Heigl


Part 1

What and WHat?

“You become what you think about all day long.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson




“Color is my daylong obsession, joy, and torment.”
― Claude Monet


“...an obsession is a way for damaged people to damage
themselves more.”
― Mark Barrowcliffe, The Elfish Gene: Dungeons, Dragons And
Growing Up Strange







Chapter 1 - Why?

Just tell me why

Why this fetish puts you on... and this is just the beginning?


or even not the begining... somewhere in the middle... because
nobody starts from this porn people start from normal porn like




Note: it's like saying to the world "Okay... I am normal... that's
why I watch this.."

...

One moment in your life you stop watching that... it no longer gives
you what you want to feel... you start searching another category...


P.S. - I was like you... it started from the most simplest porn...
from there it escaleted... to pornogrpahic games then to even
masturbating... I learn about masturbating from porn.... not from
my mom... or from somewhere... else... but from this all videos...
games.... it just motivates you to start more and more...


But in the end what you get


relaxtion... just for few minutes... and also kinda happiness...
which after few hours it costs - makes you feel guilty.


and what's good all about that?

...

You regret everything

Your life gets worst with each day
You feel lost
YOu feel like you have lost purpose
and you want that?


Really?


Life is not about images and staying home... it's theory... you
need to practice.
Chapter 2 - Just

Listen... to come here you need first to go and check out the first
volume which is Brain On Porn (Social #1) by DeYtH Banger

YOu neeed to stop focusing on that porn


it won't take you anywhere


...

Losing time
...

Wasting time


and for what?


Degrenation!?
Anger!?
ANd behavior which makes you odd


in the eyes of others


do you want?



...
If not... try to do things... without thinking if you masturbate
overthink it... if you speak with somebody... just go... go ... say
something and see how far it will go if bad... ugghh... and what?



...

There is a girl over there... and what we do?

...

We decline sitting there

If we go and ask her... we be nice
and in the end we end up in the dark room with blue screen


BUt all that happens from your naggining voice

first it tells you that you don't need
girls, have relationship and even friends.. but in the end you end
up in a room watching nude people...

didn't your voice said that you don't need that?
...

girls, females... and now you have that!?

...

So your voice sabotage... your choice of talking to that girl which

you saw on the street or in the bus... or even at school

because your voice creates a wall... invisible barrier aka anxious.




Chapter 3 - Happiness

Nobody wants you happy, you have friends but they never call
you out.. mainly because you missed few years going out with them.

...

Suggesting out... most of the people say

"I am busy"
"I can't"
"I am not interested."
"No"
"Some other day."
"Why didn't you say earlier?"


Pornography:

It promises you naked women

Variety of material
Variety of categories


but in the end you end up

anxious
less happy
anxiety

What type of happiness is that?

...
Don't you want to be happy?
Don't you want to have goals?
Don't you want to have purpose?
Don't you want to have better life?

...

Don't you want to be creative, productive?

...

School is going to create stress... nobody goes to school the first
few years anxious and less happy... everyone is happy for what next
is going to happen to them... until the next 4-5 years... make their
life hell.

School is not life... but it's how one place where all are equal in
the end... some of them end up in groups and other don't fit
anywhere.

...

If you don't fit anywhere you are strange

iF YOU FIT SOMEWHERE AND START SMOKING OR DRINKING OR...
TORTURE YOURSELF... THAT'S NOT FITTING... but trying to be someone
who you ain't

...

There are plenty of bandoge porn... which wants you to start craving
(and having desires to do such absurd things.


 Note: Don't be rough with yourself, such addiction is normal in
this world



Chapter 4 - Anxiety

50 Things to Do to Get Yourself Out of a Social Anxiety Rut

How to Break Free From a Pattern of Socially Anxious Behavior




Social anxiety disorder (SAD) affects up to 13% of the
population. People with SAD suffer in all areas of their lives; they
have trouble making friends and maintaining friendships, finding life
partners, finding work and building a career, and even getting
through the mundane aspects of daily life.
Although SAD can be seriously debilitating, and the best
treatment approach involves combining cognitive-behavioral therapy
(CBT)and/or medication (such as SSRIs), there is much that can be
done through self-help to overcome social anxiety.
Self-help strategies often draw on the effective components of
other more traditional treatment approaches. For example, self-help
might incorporate aspects of relaxation, thought reprogramming,
and exposure to feared situations.
If you suffer from mild to moderate social anxiety, you might just
feel like you are in a rut most of the time. What is the best way to
get out of a rut? Do something.
Here are 50 ideas of things to do to get yourself out of a social
anxiety rut.



1. Start an Exercise Program

If you do not already exercise regularily, start planning a program
for yourself today. Exercise not only increases feelings of well-being
and reduces anxiety, but if done in the company of others it offers
the chance to build up your social skills in a relatively non-
threatening environment.
If you don't have the resources or the time to join a gym or
participate in regular exercise classes, there is still lots that you can
do. Consider taking up walking or running or practice yoga at home.



2. Set Some Goals


Part of goal setting involves deciding where you want to end up,
but it also involves learning and setting a benchmark of where you
are now. One way to do this is by taking some self-
assessment quizzes to see how you score in terms of social anxiety
(the Liebowitz scale is a good one to try).
Then down the road, after you have started to get yourself out of
the rut, you can take the quiz again and see if your scores have
improved. Remember not to compare yourself to others in terms of
social success; compare yourself to how you were doing one week,
one month, or one year ago.


3. Start Saying "Yes"


Perhaps you have gotten into a rut of saying "No" to everything.
Instead, why not start saying "Yes?" If you are invited to do
something social, try to make a habit out of accepting the invitation.
Although you might feel anxious at first, over time the more you
do, the less fearful you will become. The next time an invitation
crosses your desk or someone at work asks you to join the group for
a coffee break, make an effort to go.



 4. Start Saying "No"


Are you a pushover? Do others make unrealistic demands on your
time or treat you poorly, but you feel powerless to stand up for
yourself? This is a time to learn how better to say "No" and how to be
more assertive.

How to Be Assertive

You don't have to go along with everything that everyone wants,

and if you don't clearly communicate what you want and need,
others are left guessing what you are thinking or how you feel.



5. Join a Support Group


Whether you join a brick-and-mortar support group or an online
group, you will find the company of others who understand what
you are going through comforting.

Where to Find a Support Group

Make the most of your time with the group; be encouraging and
look for ways to help others. Your acts of kindness will be paid back
to you.



6. Say "I am Nervous"


Everyone who speaks in public gets a little nervous. One of the
best antidotes for anxiety about public speaking is to simply
acknowledge how you are feeling before you begin.
In many settings it is completely acceptable to start off your
speech with a laugh and a comment such as "Forgive me if I stumble
over my words, you see I just get a little nervous speaking in public."
Immediately you are helping yourself out of the rut of slipping into
a panic attack while speaking. Others will also be more forgiving
than you might think.

How to Conquer Speech Anxiety

How to Give a Wedding Speech

7. Buy Yourself a New Outfit



Retail therapy is obviously no cure for social anxiety, but
sometimes clothing really can make you feel like a new person
with a new attitude. Try to get yourself out of a rut by purchasing
something outside your comfort zone. Choose a unique accent piece
both to try something new and to give others a conversation starter
when they first meet you.




8. Cherish Being Alone

Some people with SAD are also natural introverts; this means
that they recharge their emotional batteries by spending time alone
instead of in the company of others.
You don't have to become a social butterfly to overcome social
anxiety; be comfortable being who you are. If that involves choosing
to time alone to gather your thoughts (rather than because of fear),
there is nothing wrong with making that choice.



9. Ask Someone on a Date


Is there someone you find attractive but that you have been too
afraid to ask on a date? Get out of that rut and make the first move!
What is the worst that can happen?
Psychologist and founder of Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy
(REBT) Albert Ellischallenged his shyness by talking to over 100
strangers on a park bench in one month. His conclusion at the end of
the month was that he had over 100 pleasant conversations and no
really bad experiences.

How to Ask Someone on a Date

10. Go Somewhere New


Do you follow the same routine every week? Visit the same
grocery store, same gas station, eat at the same restaurant, or walk
the same block?
Try breaking out of your routine by going somewhere new. Not
only will your challenge your social anxiety about new surroundings,
but you might discover you have been missing out on some great
aspect of your neighborhood.


11. Join Toastmasters


If you have a significant fear of public speaking, make a point of
joining Toastmasters International... today! This group has helped
people around the globe improve public speaking
skills and overcome speech anxiety. Best of all, the group provides
feedback for each other, so it is a great chance to meet people and
make new friends.

Toastmasters International

12. Stop Trying to Be Perfect


Perfectionism and social anxiety often go hand in hand.
Everything that you say and everything you do doesn't have to be
perfect. Make a point of being imperfect and taking chances for a
day.



13. Take a Vacation

As simple as it sounds, sometimes we all just need a change of
scenery. If you are really stuck in a socially anxious mindset, try
taking off for a weekend to a new locale, even if it is a solo trip. Soak
up some of the local cultures, and immerse yourself in a different
pace.
At the same time, try on a different way of looking at yourself.
You are more than your social anxiety, and it doesn't define who you
are.


14. Read a Book



We are not talking about romance novels here. Choose either a
motivational story or a self-help book and set about a course of
change based on what you read.
If you really want to break out of your rut while making your way
through the book, join an online SAD support forum and post about
what you are doing to make changes in your life, according to the
book. You may find others join in your quest.

List of Self-help Books

15. Do Something Exciting


Try something totally off-the-wall like a hot air balloon ride or a
zip-line adventure. Lose yourself in an exciting adventure and forget
about your social anxiety. Best of all, the next time someone asks
you what you do for fun, you will have a great story to tell.


16. Replace Negativity with Positivity



Being positive is contagious. If you have a habit of seeing the
world through a negative lens (which most people with SAD tend to
do), try becoming an optimist, if only for a day at first.
Replace any negative thoughts with more positive alternatives.
See if that doesn't help you start to climb out of your rut.

8 Tips for Changing Negative Thinking

17. Surround Yourself with Positive People

If at all possible, try to spend more time with positive people;
people who love you, believe in you, and see the beauty in who you
are despite your social anxiety.
Spending time with these people will make you feel good and
help you to weather any rough times as you try to make changes in

 18. Be Accountable to Someone


You may stay in your rut forever if nobody knows you are trying
to move past your social anxiety and you are not accountable to
anyone. Choose someone you trust, it could even be an online friend,
and tell them about your plans to make changes in your life.
This works very much like having an exercise partner; the other
person keeps you honest and keeps you from giving up when the
road seems to hard and long.


19. Sign Up for a Cause

Join a cause that you believe in and that will get you out into the
community and meet new people. Help animals find adoptive homes,
walk for charity or fight third world hunger. Find a purpose beyond
yourself and your space in the world, and some of the mundane
problems of the day might seem just that.


20. Start Staying "Hi" to the Neighbour

Do you scurry for your door every time the neighbor appears?
Next time try to make a concerted effort to say hello, wave and be
friendly. Although this might feel out of character and anxiety-
provoking at first, over time this new habit will become second
nature.
If you are feeling really bold, try a behavioral experiment: Invite
your neighbor over for coffee at a time when she is clearly busy. Seek
out rejection and learn that it is not so bad! At some point down the
road, you might even find you have made a friend out of a neighbor.

How to Talk to Neighbors

21. Strike up a Conversation


Do you shy away from talking to strangers? Do you avoid eye
contact at the grocery store? Do you look at your feet in the
elevator? Today, instead of doing what you normally do in those
situations, try doing the opposite. Engage the other person in a bit of
small talk, just for the sake of getting the practice and learning not
to be afraid.

10 Good Small Talk Topics

10 Bad Small Talk Topics

22. Give a Great Handshake

Are you known for limp noodle handshakes? Surprise everyone
you meet with a firm solid handshake and great eye contact. This is
an easy social skill to learn that can help you make the best first
impression.

How to Shake Hands

10 Worst Types of Handshakes

23. Take a Class

Take a class in something that interests you: pottery, cooking,
skiing, golf... anything that gets you out meeting people and learning
a new skill will do the trick.
Joining a class will give you the opportunity to build confidence,
expose yourself to social situations, and potentially make new
friends.


24. Stop Complaining and Blaming


Perhaps you were dealt a bad hand in life. Maybe you had a
controlling mother or a father who put you down. Although these
life experiences may have contributed to your social anxiety, you
don't need to let them continue to influence the course of your life.
Start taking responsibility for your actions and behavior.


25. Hire a Life Coach


If traditional treatment isn't an option for you, for whatever
reason, consider instead investing in some sessions with a life coach.
Coaches can help you identify your goals and obstacles to
success; although they will not be able to specifically help you to
overcome social anxiety, life coaches can help steer you down a more
positive path of daily living.



26. Start Paying Attention

Chances are your thoughts and feelings have become so
automatic you don't even realize what runs through your head on a
daily basis. Slow down, take the time to focus on the present, and
examine the thoughts that pass through your mind; especially
the negative ones.
If you need to, keep a journal to really get a handle on your daily
thought patterns.

How to Practice Mindfulness

27. Make Changes for Yourself, Not Others

Be careful about your reasons for wanting to change. If daily life
is painful, that is a reason to get a handle on social anxiety.
However, if you just want to impress your friends on Facebook or in
real life with your social skills and popularity, the changes you make
won't last.


28. Stop Putting Things Off

Perhaps you envision some point in the future when you can
conquer your fears. Maybe when you are older, have more money to
pay for therapy, or when you are feeling stronger.
The reality is that there is never a better time than now. Stop
procrastinating and start your journey of change today.


29. Reward Yourself

It isn't going to be much fun getting out of a rut if you never
reward yourself for your efforts. Choose something that you know
will be rewarding for you, and indulge when you have made changes
in your life; be it daily, weekly, monthly or yearly.
Ideas might include a special meal, new novel, or even a vacation
you have dreamt of.


30. Work with Your Strengths

In order to get yourself out of a social anxiety rut, you don't need
to have an end goal of becoming a stand-up comedian or
accomplished concert pianist.
If you love books, maybe joining a book club or even leading a
book club would be your thing. Think about your interests and
talents, and how you can bring more sociability into those areas in
your life.


31. Help Someone Else


 One of the best ways to feel better about yourself is to help
someone else. Although helping others can be difficult when you
have social anxiety, there are many outside-the-box ways that you
can help people.
Consider joining a social anxiety forum and offering support to
someone going through a rough time. Think about someone who
might be alone or feeling lonely and send them a card, note or email
to brighten their day. Do a little something for someone else every
day and you will soon start feeling better about yourself and life in
general.


32. Make One Little Change

Sometimes we can get caught up thinking that the changes that
we need to make to get out of a rut need to be big. Make one little
change and see if it has ripple effects in your life.
The change could be as small as watching the news every evening
to keep up on current events and have more to say during small talk.


33. Try an Herbal Supplement

If you really feel like trying something medicinal, but aren't yet
ready to broach the topic of medication with your doctor or
psychiatrist, consider trying an herbal supplement from your drug
store.
There are many herbal supplements that are used
in managing anxiety; however, it is important to know that herbal
supplements are not regulated by the United States Food & Drug
Administration the same way that traditional medications are
evaluated. Be sure to read about any cautions, warnings or
medication interactions before taking an herbal supplement.

Herbal Supplements for Social Anxiety

Note: Life is not about this







34. Tell Someone!

One of the hardest parts about having social anxiety is that it is
usually a very private battle that is fought. Perhaps you have never
talked to anyone about your fears. If you really want to get out of a
rut, you need to open up to at least one person.
Only you know who that person should be; perhaps you would
feel more comfortable talking to someone who doesn't know you
personally (such as a doctor, teacher, or clergy person) or maybe a
friend or family member would be the right choice.
The minute you start opening up about how you feel, the less
scary your problems will seem.


35. Challenge Yourself

Are you working at a job that doesn't make use of your skills and
talents? Have you always taken the "safe" route because of your
social anxiety? Try breaking out of a rut by leaving your safe zone
and taking on those challenges that help you grow as a person.
Accept the promotion at work, go back to school for a new career,
or start your own business. Follow your passion and your dreams
and don't let social anxiety stand in your way.

36. Work on a Friendship

Everyone has the potential for one or more friendships in their
life. Perhaps there is someone you know that has tried to get to
know you better but you have stalled the friendship; it's time to take
the reins and work at turning that person into a friend.
Although it might seem hard at first, over time you will be glad to
see a familiar face at work, at the gym, or in your college class. Take
the initiative and extend and an invitation to do something together;
don't rely on the other person to always make the first move.

How to Make Friends

37. Make it a Competition

Do you have a competitive nature? If so, could you make a sport
out of trying to overcome your social anxiety? If you clam up at
dinner parties, try over-preparing with interesting stories to tell.
Try to ask every person at least one question. Keep track of how
many times you speak and give yourself points. Make it a game!


38. Visualize What You Want

What exactly do you want? If you haven't defined this for
yourself, then you don't know where you are headed or how to get
there. Do you want more friends, a better job, or simply not to feel
anxious all the time?
Visualize having those things that you want; this will help
motivate you to do what needs to be done to get out of a rut.

How to Practice Guided Imagery

39. Appreciate What You Have

Though you may have been dealt a bad hand when it comes to
having social anxiety, there is probably much in your life to be
thankful for. Take the time to express gratitude for what you do
have.


40. Get Adequate Sleep

Make sure you are getting enough sleep; lack of rest can cause
you to feel less than your best and exacerbate anxiety.


41. Laugh

Sometimes people with social anxiety spend so much time
worrying and fretting that they forget to laugh and have fun. When
was the last time you watched a funny movie that made you laugh
out loud? Who was the last person that made you chuckle?
Try to bring more laughter into your life. If you aren't having fun,
what is the point?


42. Stop Thinking Nothing Will Work for You

The key to getting out of a rut is to act; not think about why
things won't work. Try to make some of the changes on this list and
observe the outcome. Never dismiss an idea because you think that
"it won't work for me."

43. Avoid the Usual Temptations

If you have a bad habit of wasting too much time on the internet
or watching television instead of socializing, try cutting back or
making it educational time in terms of learning about SAD and social
skills.
See how much time you gain to focus on overcoming your social
anxiety and building your social skills.


44. Stop Waiting to be Rescued

If you think that your problem won't be solved until the magic
bullet appears, then you will never get started making changes on
your own. Take responsibility for the changes that you need to make,
and realize that nobody else is going to take the reins.


45. Talk to Someone Who Has "Been There and Done That"

That person might be a friend in an online forum or someone you
meet in a support group. The goal is to have someone to talk to who
has been through social anxiety, knows what it feels like to be stuck,
and knows what it takes to make it out to the other side.


46. Spend Time in Nature

Being outdoors has a natural calming effect. If you work indoors
or spend most of your time indoors, try getting outside more often.
Break up your routine with a walk through the park whenever you
can.


47. Start Eating Better

If you suffer from social anxiety, make sure that you are eating a
balanced diet and avoiding sugar, caffeine and alcohol as much as
possible.
A poor diet can wreak havoc with your brain chemistry, and leave
you feeling sluggish and worn down. Too much caffeine and sugar
can also increase feelings of anxiety.


48. Read Inspirational Quotes

Former anxiety sufferer Jamie Blyth included motivational quotes
as part of his personalized self-improvement plan. Sign up for a
motivational quote news feed on Facebook or visit a motivational
blog daily.


49. Watch Movies

Watch movies with confident characters and practice behaving in
the same manner. Many great performers have built confidence by
watching and learning others who they wish to emulate.


50. Seek Treatment


Sometimes you just can't get yourself out of a rut; especially if it
is more of a deep hole that you have dug yourself into. If this is you,
and you are finding yourself completely overwhelmed by social
anxiety, to the point that it is interfering significantly with your daily
functioning, it is time to seek outside help.
Your family doctor is a good place to start. Even though you
might feel afraid to reach out and admit that you have a problem,
you will be glad that you did.

How to Talk to Your Doctor About SAD

 The bottom line when trying to break yourself free of a social
anxiety rut is to remember that everything takes time. No matter
what changes you make in your life, you will not go from socially
anxious to social butterfly overnight.
Be pleased with any small progress that you make; every journey
begins with small steps and it is important for you to get started and
not worry too much about your goal now. Focus on the journey and
your actions will take you there.










Chapter 4.1 - Anxiety

How I Calmed My Anxiety in One Evening

It sounds too good to be true, but anxiety really is something that
can be reduced very quickly. While you cannot CURE your anxiety in
one day, you can CALM it to a degree that it stops affecting you as
much. With the right tools and tricks, you can successfully calm your
anxiety in as little as one evening, and potentially leverage those
improvements towards fighting your anxiety permanently once and
for all.



Attacking Anxiety Based on Symptoms


Symptom relief is the key to attacking anxiety. By placing
individual symptoms into buckets or groups, you can control anxiety
separately in a way that will allow you to permanently prevent
anxiety from controlling your life.


But let's say you have to reduce your anxiety in one evening. Is it
possible? The answer is absolutely yes. In fact, there are many
strategies that help control anxiety that can take place in as little as
a single day.

Step 1: Exercise

Before you do anything else, go for a jog. Jogging is quite literally
as effective as anxiety medications, with none of the side effects.
Studies have compared jogging (and most intense exercise) to
medications and found that jogging reports results that are just as
strong, with none of the side effect risk.
 You've always thought that jogging was important to your
physical health, but by taking up jogging you can immediately see
results for your mental health. Jogging releases endorphins
(neurotransmitters that improve mood), relaxes muscles, burns away
the stress hormone cortisol, improves sleep, and provides mental
distractions. Some people find that jogging alone literally cures them
of their anxiety disorder. Make sure the first thing you do is jog.

Step 2: Breathing Training

If you're suffering from anxiety this very moment, see how you're
breathing. Often you'll either feel like you're not getting a deep
breath or you'll be breathing too quickly. These create hyperventila
tion, and hyperventilation is one of the main causes of most
physical anxiety symptoms.
So start breathing better. There is a method of relaxation known
as deep breathing that can be effective, but it can take a while to
practice. For now (since we only have one evening), simply slow down
your breathing to 15 seconds minimum, and do your best to fight
any urge to take a deep breath or cough.
This will help you regain the carbon dioxide you lost when you
hyperventilated, and improve blood flow to your brain.

Step 3: Sensory Stimulation

Generally, technology actually creates more anxiety. Staring at
bright moving lights, watching stressful things on TV, playing around
with your iPhone - all of these have been known to increase anxiety.
But technology isn't always a bad thing. Anxiety can actually
decrease as a result of sensory stimulation. The more you surround
yourself with mental distractions, the less your mind is able to focus
on anxiety. When you have anxiety, your mind is your own worst
enemy.
The best type of sensory stimulation is one that involves doing
healthy activities with your friends, like hiking. But assuming you're
in your own home and your friends are not available, turning on
humorous and non-stressful TV shows, listening to happy and/or
relaxing music, and working on a puzzle or talking on the phone with
someone you love are all effective ways to make it much harder to
think about your anxiety.
Anxiety is self-sustaining. It causes thoughts that increase anxiety.
Overwhelming your senses is a powerful way to decrease the amount
of thinking and internalizing you do. Make sure that every piece of
technology you choose though is always focused on happiness and
relaxation. No dramas, no horror shows, no loud and angry rock
music, no reality TV shows. It doesn't matter if these things relax you
- they stimulate anxiety at a subconscious level, and are thus not
effective ways to promote relaxation.

Step 4: Journaling

It may sound like something only children do, but writing out
your thoughts is incredibly therapeutic. In fact, all thoughts - even
those that aren't inherently stressful - can cause anxiety. Your mind
has a tendency to feel stress when it's trying to remember things,
and when it focuses on negative things.
So keep a notebook by you and start writing out the thoughts
that come into your head, no matter what they are. This activity will
put those thoughts on paper so that your mind doesn't feel it needs
to focus on them anymore, and this will reduce your anxiety.

Step 5: Accepting Anxiety

You also need to be okay with your anxiety symptoms and not
try to fight them. Ironically, the act of trying to fight anxiety creates
anxiety, because you essentially are pushing yourself and stressing
yourself to rid yourself of that same stress. Fighting anxiety isn't
possible.
Anxiety is an incredibly curable condition, and nearly everyone
that seeks treatment can eventually find relief. But fighting it simply
doesn't work. Be okay with your anxiety, and know that it's not
something that will affect you forever so that you can face it head
on and not be ashamed of it or mad at yourself.

 Other Methods of Overnight Anxiety Control

If you integrate just these five things into your life right now, your
anxiety will decrease overnight. But let's assume you have more time.
You can also do all of the following:

Drink WaterDehydration is extremely common in today's society,

and studies have shown that it makes anxiety symptoms worse.
Even if you don't feel thirsty, drink more water and you may find
that your anxiety decreases right away.
Take MagnesiumMagnesium is a mineral that studies have shown
often provides anxiety relief. In addition, as many as 50% of the
country is magnesium deficient due to modern food processing
practices. Talk to your doctor about taking magnesium for your
anxiety.
Herbal SupplementsLike magnesium, many herbal supplements
have been shown to help with anxiety. Talk to your doctor about
taking kava, which is considered one of the most effective herbal
supplements out there and non-addictive.

Taking a long bath or shower may also have some benefit, as can
lovemaking with your partner. Combine all of these strategies and
your anxiety may be drastically reduced quite literally overnight.


Note: Possible


Heart Pounding From Anxiety? Yes. Heart Attack? No.



It's one of the first causes of death you learn as a child. When
people are sick or old, their heart stops, and they die. So when you
start to feel like there is something seriously wrong with your heart,
it's no wonder that your mind thinks only the worst.
You may have a heart condition. But if you're one of the millions
of people with pounding heartbeat and a healthy heart, chances are
you are suffering from anxiety - most likely an anxiety attack. It's
one of the most common, but most frightening symptoms of anxiety.


Heart Pounding = Anxiety?

As soon as your heart starts pounding it may be a sign something
is seriously wrong. But it may also be a natural reaction to anxiety
and breathing. Often doctors will ask you if you have any other
symptoms.


The Cycle of Pounding Heartbeats

Most people have experienced an increased heartbeat as a result
of nervousness. But there are times when you're convinced that
something is wrong - you're convinced that this pounding heartbeat
means something more. Maybe it comes with other symptoms, like
chest pain or lightheadedness, and you're sure that you're having a
heart attack.
But that's what anxiety does to you. While only a doctor can rule
out heart related disorders, the truth is that pounding heartbeat is
often the result of anxiety.


Anxiety - especially panic attacks - are a frequent cause of rapid
heartbeat. Unfortunately, they are also characterized by a "feeling of
doom." Your body erroneously tells you that something is seriously
wrong, and so you experience profound fear and dread that you're
about to die. This leads to two cycles of anxiety that lead to further
pounding heartbeat.

Cycle 1:


Your heartbeat increases.

You notice that this heartbeat feels different and scary.
You experience severe anxiety, and most likely a panic attack.
You experience other symptoms associated with heart disease,
like chest pains.
You recover from the pounding heartbeat.
You worry that you may have a heart problem.
Your worries cause anxiety over your health.
Your heartbeat increases.

This is a common cycle in people suffering from anxiety attacks
and panic attacks. Unfortunately, it's not the only cycle either. You'll
also find that during an anxiety attack, you experience the following:

Cycle 2:

Your heartbeat increases.

Your anxiety over your heartbeat increases.
Your heartbeat increases further.
You try to breathe more to calm yourself down.
Your heartbeat increases further.

This effect is caused by hyperventilation. It occurs when you feel
as though you're not getting enough air (even though you are), so
you take in more air. Your body then gets too much oxygen, and
your heart has to pump harder, leading to other symptoms as well,
such as chest pain.
Going to the doctor is important, but it doesn't always help. The
experience of a pounding heartbeat, along with the feeling of
impending doom, are both very real, so it becomes too easy to
convince yourself that the doctor missed something.
Even if you know you have panic attacks, it may not help. That's
because it simply changes your cycle:

Modified Cycle 1:

You worry that you may have another panic attack.

Your heartbeat increases because of that anxiety.
You get severe anxiety because you believe you're going to suffer
from another panic attack.
You start to hyperventilate.
Your pounding heart increases further, and the chest pains come.
You start to worry about your health again, or worry that you
may have another panic attack.
Your heartbeat increases because of that anxiety.

Rapid heartbeat is a symptom that is often times self-sustaining
unless you know how to handle it, and when it comes with that
feeling of "something is wrong" that occurs during anxiety attacks, it
can quickly become a more serious anxiety issue that requires a
stronger treatment.

How to Control Pounding Heart From Anxiety

Controlling your pounding heart requires an understanding of
what is causing it and what it takes to place it under control.
Remember that while an anxiety attack may feel like a heart attack,
they're not the same thing, and suffering from a panic attack is not
dangerous. In the midst of a pounding heartbeat, consider the
following:

Deep Breathing Start with deep breathing exercises, structured to

ensure you're no longer hyperventilating. Remember that
although you may feel like you're not getting a deep breath, the
truth is that you're actually breathing fine and have taken in too
much oxygen. Take slow, controlled breaths through your
stomach (not through your chest). Hold your breath in for a few
seconds before breathing out, just as slowly.


Walk In some cases, pounding heartbeat can make you feel

dizzy. But if you're not feeling too dizzy, go for a walk. This will
get your heart pumping blood more efficiently and should assist
in helping you get your breathing under control.

Call Someone Talking on a cell phone can actually be beneficial

as well. For starters, it calms any worries you have that you're
going through your pounding heartbeat alone. When you call
someone on the phone, you're also distracting your mind away
from the pounding heartbeat. This can reduce some of those
persistent negative thoughts that make it hard to recover.

Panic attacks tend to peak about 10 minutes in and then start a
very slow recovery process, so the pounding heartbeat will usually
subside on its own, but the severity can be reduced using the above
tools and tips.
Once you've reduced the severity of your panic attacks, the next
step is to stop them from coming back. This is a process that involves
a significant amount of help, because you essentially need to re-
train your body to overcome the severe anxiety you experience
during these attacks.


How to Stop Feeling Nervous From Anxiety



Even though nothing is happening, you feel tense. You're nervous
about something in your life. Maybe you're nervous about someone
you care about. Maybe you're nervous about your own safety. Maybe
you're nervous about how others are going to see you socially. Maybe
you're not even sure why you're nervous, but you can tell that you're
nervous anyway.
 Those with anxiety often not only feel nervous - they have more
worried thoughts as well. Anxiety changes thought patterns. It
genuinely makes you feel as though there is something to worry
about, even when you should not be worried, and for many people
this can cause them significant amounts of distress.


CURE Your Nervousness

When you start to feel nervous about silly things, or you're
nervous all the time, or the nervousness becomes too overwhelming,
you may have an anxiety disorder.


Uncontrolled Nervous Thoughts

Nervousness is actually a healthy emotion. If you couldn't get
nervous, you would take many more risks, and possibly put yourself
in danger. Nervousness is a tool that your body uses to notify you
that you should be afraid, and without it you'd have no idea that you
need to fight or flee any given situation.
But that nervousness needs to be contained. If you get nervous all
of the time, that may indicate you need some very real help.


How to Tell Your Nervous Thoughts Are Out of Control
What makes anxiety frustrating at first is that many people do
not know they have it. Their nervous thoughts feel completely
normal. When someone develops anxiety, they may notice that they
find more and more things to inspire feelings of nervousness. Yet to
them, these are genuinely anxiety-producing stimuli.
Usually physical symptoms are the first sign that you have
developed an anxiety disorder. When your nervousness tends to
cause:

Rapid heartbeat
 Severe muscle tension
Weakness
Nausea or feelings of illness

These are often a sign that your anxiety is getting worse.
Furthermore, those with anxiety often have thoughts that cascade to
worst case scenarios. They cannot control a nervous thought
themselves, and may even have flashes of worst-case-scenario
thinking that no one can talk them out of.
It's this unprompted, potentially out of control nervousness that
indicates something is wrong with your coping ability. If this
nervousness is paired with physical anxiety symptoms, it is an even
greater indicator that you may be suffering from a very real anxiety
problem.

Ways to Treat Nervousness

One of the toughest questions to answer is how you can control
your nervous thoughts. Numerous psychological studies have
confirmed that it's impossible to force yourself not to think about
something. In fact, some studies have shown that trying not to think
about something may make you more likely to think about it,
because you'll have to keep reminding yourself not to think about it,
thus triggering the memory.
So ideally, you need to find a strategy that will control the
nervousness, not necessarily eliminate it, and thankfully there are a
lot of very effective options for stopping nervous thinking:

Writing the Thoughts Out Something that increases the

frequency of nervous thoughts is how much your brain wants to
make sure it remembers them. For some reason, your mind is
terrified of forgetting things that it thinks are important, so it
will cause you to focus on them more than necessary. By writing
out your thought on a piece of paper or journal, you'll
essentially be taking the information out of your brain and
 putting it in a permanent place. That should reduce your mind's
need to make you remember it.

Go Jogging Physical tension is the hallmark of an anxiety

problem, and one of the main issues that affects those with
intense nervousness. Physical tension also appears to contribute
to nervous thoughts, in ways that researchers still have been
unable to grasp. You can solve both issues by simply going for a
jog. Running tires the muscles in a way that can reduce the
amount of anxiety symptoms you experience and possibly
improve your ability to cope with anxiety.

Mental Distractions You can't force yourself to stop thinking a

thought. But you can make it much harder to have that thought
because your focus is on so many different things. Give yourself
mental distractions by turning on the TV (to something happy, of
course) and doing some art or crafts. This type of combination
distracts all of your senses, and makes it harder to focus on
negative thoughts.

Relaxation Exercises There are several relaxation strategies that

may be effective as well. These take practice though. Many try to
do them for the first time only to find that they don't help.
That's because relaxation exercises can't help until you have
practiced them so many times that it's second nature. In the
beginning, the focus is on doing the exercises correctly. Only
after you know how to do them correctly will they start to have
an effect. Some of the most popular include:

 Mantra Meditation
Deep Breathing
Progressive Muscle Relaxation
Visualization
Yoga

Talk to Someone Therapy is an incredibly valuable tool for

controlling nervous thoughts, because it directly combats faulty
thought processes. But for those that can't afford therapy or
refuse to seek out therapy, talking to someone that cares about
you is the next best thing. Not only will you get input from
someone important in your life - you'll also find it harder to
focus on what makes you nervous when you're talking to
someone on the phone or in person.

None of these will stop nervous thinking forever. But what
they can do is ensure that you're not able to be as affected by
your nervous thoughts. Each one provides you with a tool that
decreases the amount of focus and attention you place on those
thoughts and make it easier to deal with the subsequent anxiety
symptoms.

How to Stop Nervous Thinking in the Long Term

Those that are nervous all the time need to treat their anxiety
like they would any health condition. They need to commit to a
treatment. Just as you wouldn't treat serious illnesses
haphazardly, the only way to find relief from anxiety is to give it
special attention, and make sure that you're focused on as many
ways as possible to permanently cure your anxiety symptoms.


How to Solve Stress and Anxiety



 Stress is a normal part of life. Stress warns you that you're
encountering problematic situations, and is designed to motivate
you to take action to reduce that stress and make your life
better. Without stress, you wouldn't feel any motivation to make
your life better. You would take risks without regard for the
consequences and make decisions that affect the course of your
life without any critical thinking to ensure it's what's best for
you. In small amounts, stress is actually a good thing.
But when that stress starts to become unreasonable – when
that stress starts to affect you every day, causing you to feel
sick, anxious, unhappy, or fatigued – then your levels of stress
have become a serious problem.

What Does Long-Term Stress Do?

Stress changes every component of your body. In excess,
stress makes the long-term outlook of your life considerably
worse. Stress:
Reduces hormone function.
Damages organs.
Weakens your immune system.
Puts you at higher risk of cancer.
Causes memory loss and concentration issues.
Develops mental health disorders.

That latter point is important. Long-term stress is one of the
key contributing factors in the development of numerous types
of mental health disorders and puts you at severely increased
risk of developing serious conditions like anxiety and depression.
In addition, these conditions lead to further stress, resulting in a
vicious cycle that can damage your quality of life.



What is the Link Between Stress and Anxiety?

Stress and anxiety are not entirely different conditions. In
many ways, anxiety may be considered long-term stress, and
long-term stress may be a component of an anxiety disorder.
Their similarities and relationships are some of the reasons that
those that experience any one for an extended period often
experience the other for much longer.

It's not clear why anxiety and stress seem to contribute to
each other, but there are several proposed possibilities. These
include:
Poor Coping Response Both anxiety and stress are often
related to problems with life coping. While generally coping
issues come first (followed by stress/anxiety), dealing with
these issues for an extended period can damage your ability
to cope even further – opening up the door for the other to
occur.

Hormone/Neurotransmitter Misfiring Another probable cause

of both conditions has to do with damage to the mind and
body when you deal with any one condition for an extensive
period. Many people believe that your body starts to fire the
wrong amounts of neurotransmitters (brain chemicals),
adrenaline, and cortisol because it becomes harder for your
body to regulate.

Negative Thinking Both stress and anxiety create
negative thinking, and negative thinking is very closely
related to coping with both of those issues. For example,
if you're stressed, you'll believe that you're bound to
experience troubles in the future, leading to anxiety over
the future, and so on.

It's very likely that stress changes your brain chemistry,
physical health, and your ability to cope with future issues,
leading to the development of anxiety and/or an anxiety
disorder. When that occurs, anxiety and stress start to
contribute to each other.
One of the best examples of this is post-traumatic stress
disorder or PTSD. PTSD is an anxiety disorder that occurs
after an extremely traumatic event. The stress is so strong
and so powerful, that the person's anxiety levels change
from that moment onward.
When it comes to stress anxiety, there is some good news
and bad news. The bad news is that unchecked, you can
continue to develop severe anxiety and stress coping
problems that can alter your quality of life. The good news
is that even if stress causes you to experience severe anxiety,
that anxiety can be addressed and cured using the right
anxiety reduction strategies and techniques. Your brain is a
powerful tool, and even when its brain chemistry is altered,
it's possible to cure it.

Contributing Factors to Chronic Stress

Remember, any chronic stress can eventually develop into
anxiety, and there are multiple issues that lead to chronic
stress. Stress also may not have an apparent cause – some
people simply feel like something is wrong, or they have lost
their coping ability for smaller life stresses. While chronic
stress can be attributed to something in your life (work,
home), it should be noted that if you experience stress for a
long enough time, you may find you have a hard time
shaking it even when/if your life gets better.
There are often external and internal factors to chronic
stress. They include:

External factors Internal factors
External factors Internal factors
Work related Bad coping skills
pressures Weak health and fitness
Relationship troubles levels
Family related Poor nutritional status
pressures Low emotional well-being
Financial difficulties Sleep problems /
 Social expectations deprivation

It's crucial to remember that chronic stress is not just
mental. A lack of exercise/activity can also be a significant
contributing factor for the development of stress and
anxiety. Your body, even without you realizing it, experiences
less stress, and in turn, this starts to affect your overall
stress levels.

Another cause of chronic stress is dependency on
inadequate coping strategies. For example, those that self-
medicate with alcohol can actually lose their ability to
manage their stress. That's because those types of coping
strategies numb stress without actually reducing your stress,
and eventually your mind starts to depend on the numbing
as you lose your ability to cope with stress naturally.
Effective Stress Management Techniques In order to
reduce your anxiety, you're going to need to learn to
manage your stress better. It starts by avoiding any "quick
fixes." When people talk about stress coping, they're talking
about your own mind's ability to overcome stresses. You
can't learn to do this if you depend on alcohol, drugs, or
even gambling/partying as your way to cope with stress.
You have to be willing to let yourself feel stressed in order to
learn how to overcome it.
Removing yourself from stressful situations is also
important, but obviously, there is only so much that one
person can do. Still, you will need to make some tough
decisions. Can you find a new job? Is it time to leave the
relationship? Do you need some new friends? If the tough
choice is the better choice, you'll need to make it.

You can and should also integrate the following into your
life:

Exercise You need to stay active. People think of exercise
as a physical fitness technique. But exercise is much
 more than that. It plays a key role in stress reduction
because it burns away many of the stress hormones
while releasing chemicals that improve mood. Those
that don't exercise are far more prone to stress, and so
it's crucial that you get yourself outdoors and try your
best to stay moving.

Do Things Staying busy is also important. Stress tends
to make you feel like you need time alone, in quiet. It
sounds like a good idea, but it's not advantageous to
stress management. Creating new happy memories,
staying active, and giving yourself positive experiences
and more to look forward to is much more important.
As long as those activities aren't "self-medicating"
(meaning, no partying to control your stress), you'll see
the benefits.

Goal Setting You need to set goals for yourself as well.
Realistic goals that you can reach, but will take you a
while to accomplish. Goals ensure that you're always at
least a little focused on the future because stress tends
to over-focused you on the present, and the present is
stressful.

You should also utilize various stress reduction strategies,
like meditation and progressive muscle relaxation. These
strategies are an effective way to control stress at the
moment, and the more you can control smaller amounts of
stress, the less other stresses will affect you.

Reducing Anxiety and Reducing Stress

Still, once you have developed chronic stress, you're
going to need something more to curb it. You're going to
need to find a way to drastically cut down on your overall
stress and anxiety levels – a method of relieving anxiety
that will help you control stress in the future.






Tips to Stop Racing Thoughts From Anxiety


Most people think of anxiety as the presence of fearful
thoughts. But it's not always fearful thoughts that are the
problem. Some people experience racing thoughts, where it
feels as though their mind is going 200 miles an hour.
Sometimes those thoughts are fearful. Sometimes they're
not. But when you have racing thoughts it can be very
stressful, which is why it's important to find personal ways
to stop racing thoughts.

What Causes These Racing Thoughts?

Racing thoughts are a strange problem. It's not just the
content of the thought. It's how it feels as though your
thoughts are firing at such a fast pace that you cannot even
remember what the last thought was, and by the time you
have a new thought another one immediately takes its
place.
Racing thoughts may affect anyone with anxiety, but it's
most common for those that have anxiety attacks.


Racing thoughts may also affect those with generalized
anxiety disorder, and may affect nearly anyone with a
disorder when they experience severe anxiety.
It's also very common at sleep. For some reason, many
people find that their thoughts seem to be more rapid when
they're trying to get to bed, and unfortunately when they
occur during bedtime it can be very hard to fall asleep.
 The causes of racing thoughts are likely related to the
way your neurotransmitters interact during anxiety, along
with the surge of adrenaline you get when you have anxiety
(which may make your brain far more active). Adrenaline,
especially, causes your mind to be over-active while
simultaneously making it harder to focus. Other causes may
include:

No Distractions One of the reasons they occur when
you're trying to go to sleep is because there are no
distractions. When you're left with your own thoughts,
your thoughts often go unchecked, and eventually they
spiral out of control.
Blood Flow to the Brain Anxiety may also cause
hyperventilation, which can temporarily cause less
blood flow to the brain. This is especially common
during anxiety attacks. It's possible that your brain is
actually simply not functioning as well, and your
inhibition ability isn't working to stop the thoughts.
Don't worry - this isn't dangerous.
Lack of Sleep Anxiety can also cause sleep deprivation,
and sleep deprivation may also lead to racing thoughts.
This can often be a self-fulfilling issue, since anxiety
leads to lack of sleep which leads to racing thoughts
which leads to a lack of sleep. That's why many find the
experience to be recurring and very stressful.

Thoughts in general are difficult to understand. There
isn't a set "cause" for racing thoughts. It's likely that anxiety
causes your mind to both react more quickly while also
limiting your ability to control those thoughts and focus on
any single one of them.
Remember that anxiety is supposed to be the activation
of your fight or flight system - a system that is supposed to
keep you safe from danger. Thinking overly quickly is
actually to your advantage, and not focusing too much on
any given thought may be beneficial as well to ensure a
quick reaction.
But since you have an anxiety disorder when no fears are
present, it's not uncommon for racing thoughts to be
stressful, and possibly even lead to more anxiety.
Stop Racing Thoughts
Racing thoughts aren't a sign of any danger, but they are
obviously a significant problem. They make it nearly
impossible to focus, and without focus it's almost impossible
to cope with anxiety. That's why it's so important to stop
your racing thoughts.
The solution tends to differ a little depending on when
your racing thoughts occur. They generally occur at three
times:
During the height of an anxiety attack.
When you're trying to go to sleep.
For no reason at all when you have anxiety.
Let's break out some tips for controlling your racing
thoughts based on when they occur.

During a Panic Attack

During a panic attack, your thoughts are often racing
and health related. You pay attention to every little change
in your body, wonder what's happening, and often
experience this degree of confusion that only makes your
thoughts worse.
Your goal is to essentially try to take yourself out of your
own head. You cannot stop the adrenaline that pumps
through your mind when you're experiencing an anxiety
attack, but you can utilize strategies that make the racing
thoughts less upsetting and possibly fight the anxiety that
causes them. Some strategies include:
Sensory Distraction Distractions are a key component
for curing racing thoughts. They're actually an incredibly
important one. You need to find a way to distract your
mind from itself so that your racing thoughts do not
become too severe. In order to "get out of your own
 head," try something simple like calling a friend that
knows you have panic attacks and talking to them.
Maintaining a phone call requires a lot of your thoughts,
and can decrease the amount of attention you can give
your anxiety, thus decreasing your racing thoughts.
Slow Breathing Hyperventilation is one of the possible
causes of racing thoughts since it causes a
lightheadedness that may make it harder to focus. You
can reduce this by slowing down your breathing so that
your carbon dioxide levels increase. Don't hold your
breath, but do take very slow, controlled breaths and
fight any urge to yawn or over-breathe.
Mantra Meditation Meditation has long been touted as a
relaxation tool, but for those with racing minds it may
be especially useful, because the act of making and
listening to mantras can quiet the mind. Mantras are
elongated sounds that cause your neck to vibrate. Close
your eyes and start making mantra noises while
breathing slowly and you may drown out the thoughts
until they slow down.
Panic attacks often need to run their course before they
can be fully controlled, because a panic attack is by its very
nature a temporary loss of control. But the above tools will
help you reel in your thoughts a bit, and then when the
panic attack passes you can get back to normal thinking.

Learn to Cope With Anxiety Attacks

Trying to Sleep
Anxiety and racing thoughts when you're trying to sleep
can be very distracting, and unfortunately they tend to build
on themselves causing greater stress that ends up keeping
you awake. Ask most people with anxiety what causes them
to stay awake at night and it's not usually fear - it's usually
a feeling as though they cannot turn off their brain.
Not everyone experiences negative thoughts either. Some
simply experience an incredibly active mind that doesn't
have a clear focus, even though the thoughts themselves are
harmless. This may not even be caused by anxiety either, but
unfortunately those with anxiety tend to respond to these
racing thoughts with more stress and anxiety, which still
makes it harder to sleep. Consider the following strategies:

Write Out the Thoughts It starts with trying to write out
any of these thoughts on some type of paper or journal.
Something that few people realize is that the mind tries
very hard to remember things, especially before sleep.
The mind also doesn't worry about remembering things
when it knows there is a note of them somewhere.
Racing thoughts may occur because your brain is trying
to remember the thoughts you can control, so write
them out on a piece of paper to give your brain a break
and help you relax.
Get Up and Do Something Else Your active thoughts are
caused not only by your anxiety. They're also caused by
you trying to fight the thoughts away and sleep. If you
find you can almost never sleep when your mind starts
to race, go give yourself something else to do or think
about. Often you'll find that all you needed was a
distraction, and some other activity can be a great tool
for ensuring that you have a calmer mind when you try
to go to sleep later.

Distracting White Noise Many people use what's known
as "white knows" as a type of mental distraction. It
works like other forms of sensory distraction. When
your brain is being used on the noise, it cannot focus as
much on its thoughts. An even better tool is listening to
something like boring talk radio at a volume so low you
can barely make out the words. This will give your mind
something else it needs to focus on so that your
thoughts cannot be as active.
Sleeping is also its own cure. If you can find a few days
to try to make up any sleep deprivation you may have,
you'll often find that your thoughts don't race as much as
they used to.

For No Reason

Finally, what should you do when your thoughts don't
seem to race for any real reason other than mild or daily
anxiety? This is when you seem to have racing thoughts
every once in a while at no specific time. Often you're still
experiencing anxiety (otherwise it's difficult to call anxiety
the cause of your racing thoughts), but you're not necessarily
in the middle of an anxiety attack.
Tips to stop racing thoughts include:


Exercise/Jog Jogging is an outstanding tool for tiring the
mind. Fitness doesn't just tire muscles. It makes your
brain more relaxed as well, by releasing chemicals that
provide a relaxation/calming effect. So exercising
and/or going for a good jog is incredibly valuable.

Walking If you can't intensely exercise, walk. Walking
provides a great deal of sensory distraction (new sights,
sounds, and smells anywhere you walk - even if you're
in your own apartment) and provides a bit of extra
blood flow that may be useful for calming your body.

Give Yourself a Task Find something you can do for a
while as your mind continues to race. Tasks give you
something to focus on. Don't worry too much about
your thoughts racing if you try to stop it, you'll actually
make it worse. Instead, give yourself something to do
that puts your focus on something that doesnt require
as much thought, like catching up on your favorite
website. That focus will ease your mind back into reality
and should slow your thoughts down considerably.

 The Only Surefire Way to Stop Anxiety Racing Thoughts

All of those tips are about reducing the length of time
you suffer from racing thoughts. You cannot simply stop
them immediately because the more you try to fight them
away, the more likely they are to continue.



Obsessive Thoughts: a Common Anxiety Symptom



Persistent and negative thoughts are one of the most
common signs of an anxiety disorder. Anxiety makes it
nearly impossible to stop focusing on things that you don't
want to focus on. These thoughts are rarely positive, often
related to either your fears or your emotions, and in many
cases the existence of the thought causes further anxiety and
often leads to more obsessions.
Obsessive thoughts are the hallmark of obsessive
compulsive disorder, but there are types of "obsessive"
thoughts that are present in a variety of anxiety disorders
that won't necessarily cause a diagnosis of OCD. Below, we'll
look at examples of these obsessive thoughts and how they
affect you.


Are You Struggling with Obessive Thoughts?

If you have been struggling with obsessive thoughts, you
may have anxiety. Take our free anxiety test to learn your
anxiety score, how it compares to others, and what you can
do to stop these obsessive thoughts and treat it.


All Types of Anxiety Can Lead to Obsessive Thoughts

The idea of "obsession" is that you cannot focus on
anything other than a specific issue (or a few issues), and no
matter how hard you try you cannot distract yourself. Many
people have these thoughts without anxiety disorders. For
example, your first crush back in high school probably
became an obsessive thought, since their affection was all
you could think about.
But when these thoughts are negative or cause you
anxiety/stress, then it's highly likely you have an anxiety
disorder.


Obsessions from OCD

Obsessive thoughts are required for someone to be
diagnosed with obsessive compulsive disorder. These
obsessive thoughts are often violent, sexual, or fearful in
nature. The thought may change depending on the situation
(more on that in a moment), but once they've entered your
mind, you'll often do anything you can to shake it.
Some examples of obsessive thoughts include:


Fear of getting sick.
Thinking about hurting a loved one or stranger.
Focusing on some type of aggressive sexual act (with
someone you know or strangers).
Need for organization or symmetry.
Worry over little things (did I lock the door, etc.).

Notice that some of these are obviously far more
negative than others. There are those that have unwanted
fantasies about murder or rape, while others may simply
constantly fear they haven't turned off the stove. But one
thing they all have in common is that they cause significant
distress, and once the thought enters a person's mind, it
becomes impossible to shake without some type of action.
That's what causes compulsions. Compulsions are the
action that the person completes in order to reduce this
obsessive thought. When the person fears germs, they may
need to wash their hands. When the person fears the door
being closed, they may need to lock in 3 or more times to
stop that fear. Those that fear something violent or sexual
may develop any habit that appears to cause the thought to
decrease.
It's crucial to remember that anxiety genuinely causes
these negative thoughts and negative thinking. The way that
anxiety alters your brain chemistry makes it very hard to
focus on the positives or the future, and so it's not your fault
that you can't distract yourself from these thoughts or that
you're having them at all.


The More You Try To Stop Them…

Numerous scientific studies have shown that trying too
hard to "not" think about something actually causes you to
think about it more than if you tried to think about it. That's
because the brain keeps reminding you of the thought in
order to remind you not to think about it. It's a strange way
the brain works that makes it very hard for someone that
wants to end their obsessive thoughts to actually stop it.
That's a serious problem for those that deal with
obsessive thoughts from OCD. If they experience too much
shame or fear over these thoughts they'll try not to have
them, and this will cause them to have the thoughts even
more.

Obsessive Thoughts in Other Anxiety Disorders

It's also possible to develop types of obsessive thoughts
with other anxiety disorders as well. Generally these will not
quite be as severe or overwhelming as the thoughts in OCD,
and you're unlikely to develop compulsions as a result, but
there are often some similarities between both anxiety
disorders. Your psychologist will be the one to diagnose
which problem you have. Some examples of how these
thoughts work include:


Panic DisorderThose with panic disorder and panic
attacks may develop hypochondria or health phobias,
worried that something is wrong with their health. They
may also fear the panic attacks to such a degree that it
is all they think about.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder- Those with PTSD often
find themselves obsessing over the trauma they
experienced, or the belief that the trauma will occur
again.

Phobias Those with very severe phobias may start to
think about the object of that fear more and more with
everything they do. For example, checking your clothes
for spiders and having someone look through your
house regularly may be a phobia obsession.

Social PhobiaThose with social phobia may think about
embarrassing themselves in social situations. In some
cases it may be a thought of something that happened,
while in others it may be worse-case-scenario thinking.

Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)- GAD is a disorder
that causes numerous worries. It's possible that some of
these worries persist. For example, worrying that your
son/daughter is in danger after they go off to college
may be a sign of GAD, and also an obsessive thought.

So while generally an obsessive thought is considered a
problem for those with OCD, it is something that can affect
those with nearly any type of anxiety disorder in some way.

Fight Your Anxiety

How to Stop Obsessive Thoughts

You need to take a holistic approach to your anxiety.
Don't just try to target the obsessive thoughts. Try to target
your anxiety as a whole in order to properly address the
way it affects you and cope with future stresses. However,
you can also try the following:

Stop Shaming Yourself

First and foremost, you need to learn to accept your
thoughts for what they are: a symptom of your anxiety. You
need to stop shaming yourself, and stop feeling like you
need to push these thoughts away.
Acceptance is crucial. These thoughts are not in your
control, and not something you should expect to control.
Learn to accept that they're a natural part of the disorder,
and that when you cure your disorder you'll have fewer of
the thoughts.
This is obviously very hard for people, but you need to
find a way. Your thoughts are what they are - they may
cause you to do silly or "irrational" things, but so what? Who
cares if you check a lock three times or wash your hands
multiple times a day? Who cares if you occasionally think
about unusually sexual or fearful things?
Yes, it's something you'll need to cure, but while they're
occurring, it's much like being sick with a cold. You don't get
mad at yourself for sneezing, so you shouldn't try to fight
your thoughts or see them as a bad part of your personality
while you're still dealing with your disorder.

Write Out Persistent Thoughts

 Sometimes you'll have a thought that isn't so much
obsessive as it is persistent. In some cases, these can bother
you enough that you start to worry they'll become obsessive
thoughts.
Try writing those thoughts out in some type of journal or
diary. Your mind has a tendency to focus on persistent
thoughts less often when it knows they're being kept in a
permanent place.

Get Used to the Anxiety

One of the hardest parts for those living with obsessive
thoughts is the idea that they should just live with the
anxiety. But learning to be okay with the anxiety is actually
an effective treatment.
Part of this will come from acceptance, as mentioned
above. But a big part of it is simply learning to let yourself
worry.
Compulsions have a tendency to provide too quick a
solution to the obsessions, causing you to avoid actually
dealing with the anxiety. But if you fight the compulsions as
best you can and let yourself be as anxious as possible for a
while, you'll often find that the obsessions cause a bit less
fear, because you know nothing will come of it.
This often needs to be completed in the presence of a
therapist, that will teach you the tricks necessary to stop
trying to solve your obsessive thoughts and simply let them
be obsessive, but allowing yourself to feel the anxiety of the
obsessive thoughts can help.

Cause Your Own Anxiety

Finally, another thing you can try with the approval of
your therapist is the idea of causing the anxiety yourself - in
other words, purposely think about the thing that causes
you that much distress.
The idea behind this is behavioral habituation. If you stop
fighting the thought and start experiencing it as often as
possible on purpose, the thought will eventually become less
stressful (and possibly even boring).
If it's something you can do, like get your hands dirty,
keep your door unlocked, purposefully disorganize your
apartment, etc., then you do it so that you get used to what
the anxiety feels like and learn to fear the anxiety less. If it's
something that you simply think to yourself, like violent
thoughts, then try to have the violent thoughts on purpose
until you accept that they have no meaning and allow
yourself to find them less irritating.
It's often best to do these in the presence of a
professional, because this type of technique may not be
right for everyone. Nevertheless, it's been shown that the
more you accept the anxieties, the easier they may be to
handle.

Not All Obsessive Thoughts Are An Anxiety Disorder

One of the reasons that OCD and other anxiety disorders
are so misunderstood is because many people claim that
they have OCD or obsessive thoughts when they do not.
You'll hear numerous celebrities, for example, that say that
they have OCD because they like their fork a certain way or
they dislike when they get dirty.
Millions of people have these issues but do not otherwise
have an anxiety disorder. For your obsessive thoughts or
compulsions to be part of an anxiety disorder they need to
happen frequently; to such a degree that they drastically
impact a person's quality of life. If you have the occasional
unusually obsessive thought or even a small compulsion or
two that otherwise has little to no impact on your
wellbeing, chances are you do not have OCD.
But if your obsessions are causing you significant distress,
then it's very likely that you have anxiety.








Chapter 4.2 - You want Confidence

Note: Porn won't get you anywhere...

Depression and anxiety go hands in hands there!





4 Confidence-Killing Habits You Need To Eliminate In Your Daily Life



Do you have any bad habits?
Is there anything you do on regularly that makes you cringe or
feel guilty right after doing it?
Our habits are actions we consistently perform. They define us.
And, that's why is so important to analyze them on a conscious level
and eliminate any "bad" habits.
I believe a "bad" habit is something that takes more than it gives.
The negative consequences of performing the habit outweigh any
positive benefits that it brings your way. And, this definition extends
beyond habits.
I believe a relationship that takes more than it gives should
similarly be eliminated — a girlfriend who causes you more stress
than happiness or a buddy whose incessant whining and shaming is
holding you back, for example.
But, I digress. I want to share four particularly bad habits that
could kill your confidence and self-esteem, if left unchecked. And, at
the end of the day, confidence is everything.
How you feel about yourself and how sure you are about your
abilities directly determines how happy you are and how successful
you'll be in your career and your relationships.
Here are some things that are probably hurting you more than
helping you:

1. Watching pornography

Almost every single one of us men starts masturbating to porn
during our teenage years. And, it's no wonder why — it feels
amazing.
In fact, so many of us engage in this habit that it's made research
on the subject nearly impossible, as there's not enough guys who
don't jerk it to porn to use for a control group.
However, the recent rise in popularity of the "no-fap" Internet
community has revealed a whole bunch of reasons you should stop.
The main two benefits guys who have stopped are realizing is a
decrease in social anxiety and the elimination of erectile dysfunction,
whether that means not being able to get it up or climaxing too
quickly.
The reasoning behind these negative effects is that when you
watch porn, you train your body to get aroused by pixels on a
computer screen instead of the touch and feel of a real woman.
And, what are the benefits? I can only think of two: sexual
education and the pleasure of an orgasm. But, most men who watch
porn have seen enough to have learned their fair share about sexual
techniques that quitting shouldn't negate the benefit.
And, you can masturbate without porn to achieve the second. So,
is watching other people have sex on a screen really worth it, guys?

2. Engaging in social media

We all engage in social media to some extent. It allows you to
stay in contact with distant friends and share what you're up to. But,
it's all too easy to tie your sense of self-worth to your social media
"game."
What I mean by this is that we're all validation-seeking beings by
default. We love recognition. It makes us feel "good" and important.
And so, posting a pic of you riding a camel in Africa and receiving
100 likes can fulfill this need.
Now, in the selfie age in which we live, this is a bigger problem
with women. But, I see guys doing it, too.
 I'm not suggesting you delete your Facebook and Instagram
profiles immediately, but rather, manage how much time and effort
you dedicate to them. Try to only do the "newsfeed scroll" once a day
to help your brain unplug from the social media matrix.

3. Playing video games

Playing video games is a form of escapism. It allows you to
escape the real world, even if just for a moment. Whether you're
LeBron James in "NBA 2K" or a badass mercenary in "Call of Duty," it
can feel damn good to dominate with the controllers.
And, escapist hobbies are good — to an extent. Getting away from
the day-to-day grind is healthy in limited doses. It's like a form of
mild meditation. But, there's a huge danger of over-consumption,
the same as with social media.
You have to draw the line somewhere or you'll risk becoming that
guy who ties his own self-worth and sense of achievement to how
quickly he can level up his "WoW" character.
You don't want to look forward to playing video games more
than you look forward actually doing things and experiencing the
world.
Grabbing a beer with buddies, going rock-climbing, hitting the
gym or reading a good book aren't things that should take second
station to firing up the Xbox.

4. Watching extensive TV

This habit is more-or-less "bad" for the same reasons as playing
videos games. Using television shows to escape the world and
immerse yourself in an alternate reality is healthy in small doses,
but you don't want to be the guy who talks about Hurley from
"Lost" like he's your real pal.





 Porn Addiction Side Effects and How to Quit Porn





Porn Addiction Side Effects

Porn is so dangerous because it can easily become a part of your
daily routine. After all, it’s not uncommon for men to admit to
jerking it to porn several times per day.
I mean, let’s face it – looking at naked chicks and busting a nut
feels good. That’s why we do it.
However when you do anything that frequently, and you do it
over the course of several years, there’s clear potential for the
activity to change how you think, act, and even identify with
yourself. This is what makes porn so dangerous. Below are some of
the more common specific side effects that can – and usually do –
develop over time if you consistently watch porn.

 1. Reduced motivation to meet and date real women

When you get used to satisfying your sexual urges by flipping
open your laptop and watching porn, why would you go out of your
way to date real women? Porn is so much easier…
But what do you really want? To get off watching OTHER people
have sex on your SCREEN… or to actually having sex yourself?

2. Erectile dysfunction

When you get used to getting turned on and ejaculating as a
result of watching pixels move around on your screen, your brain
will physically change. It will train itself to be aroused by watching
porn instead of being with a real woman.
This ability of our brain to “rewire” itself is called
neuroplasticity… and it’s very real.
Now, there are many different ways to naturally improve erectile
function. But at the end of the day, if you’re dysfunction is caused by
porn addiction, you’re going to have to quit in order to get back to
normal.

3. Unrealistic sexual expectations

The women you see in porn are wearing absurd amounts of
makeup, and most of them have undergone multiple plastic
surgeries. Real women don’t look like pornstars (and that’s a good
thing – google “pornstars without makeup” if you don’t believe me).
This is another reason you can develop sexual dysfunction – real
women often “fail” to live up to the pornographic fantasies you’ve
become so accustomed to.
Another significant way porn can alter your sexual expectations is
how they depict common sexual scenarios. Women simply don’t
initiate sex like they do in porn – it tends to be the man’s job. So you
can stop waiting on your teacher, flight attendant, or cleaning lady
to strip down and fuck you in the middle of the day…

4. Shame spiraling

Do you feel guilty about watching porn? Is it something that you
hide from other people?
The truth is that many guys are ashamed that they watch
porn. It’s not in line with their principles.They know it’s a bad habit,
and that other people look down upon it, and so they do it in
secrecy. And this eats away at their self-esteem and makes them feel
insecure, unworthy, and just all-around shitty about themselves.

5. Escalating to extreme and perverted sexual tastes

One trend that’s been recorded is the tendency of men to view
more and more extreme forms of porn as time goes on.
A simple man on women sex scene begins to fail to arouse them
and so they move onto threesomes, gang bangs, rape scenes, and
other perverted types of porn. I won’t even go into how this will fuck
up your brain and turn you into an all-out pervert – it should be
obvious.

6. It can lead you to putting women and sex on a pedestal

Watching porn can make sex seem more like a dream and less
like a reality – especially if you aren’t regularly getting laid. And this
can lead you to pedestalizing women and the act of sex. After all, if
you need to watch porn to release your sexual urges, then could it be
that you aren’t worthy of real-life women?







Quitting porn is so important because it frees you from all of the
negative side effects I mentioned above. Some will take time, and
others will diminish immediately – but they will all go away if you
can stick to your guns for the long haul.
 If you’re currently struggling to quit porn, follow the steps below,
stop watching porn, and I promise that you’ll be that much happier,
more confident, and sexually potent for doing so.

1. Change your identity

Studies have shown that we often must change how we see
ourselves in order to change our behaviors. For example, if you
struggle to goto the gym you might buy a bunch of new gym clothes
in order to start thinking of yourself as a “gym rat” – with the hopes
of this identity change sparking your motivation to hit the gym.
I think a simple identity change that will help you stop watching
porn is to think of it as a silly behavior that a weaker, more insecure,
and less experienced version of yourself used to do. When you think
about hitting up your favorite porn site, just laugh and think about
how stupid and pointless it is, and how you don’t do that shit
anymore. It’s never very satisfying or fulfilling anyways.

2. Jerk it without porn

There’s a test out there called the “Porn Induced Erectile
Dysfunction Test”. All it involves is masturbating without watching
pornography or imagining a pornographic fantasy. If you can get
hard and ejeactualte without much effort, you pass. If not, you fail –
and you likely have porn-induced ED.
Beyond this being a good test, it’s also an acceptable way to
release pent up sexual energy without resorting to watching porn.

3. Replace it with another habit

This is a simple technique that works for kicking any bad habit.
The same way that a nicotine addict might chew a piece of gum
when they want to smoke a cig, you need to find something else to
do when you get the urge to watch porn. Exercising
and meditating are two activities I recommend for suitable
replacements – or, at first, jerking it WITHOUT porn.

 4. Don’t beat yourself up when you do it

Relapse is not only probable – it’s inevitable. Rather than shaming
yourself and feeling like shit, reflect on what led you to relapsing
and think about how you can better handle the situation next time
you get the urge. Being too hard on yourself will only cultivate more
self-hate and lead to a more vicious cycle of relapse in the future.

5. Get away from your computer when you get the urge

Question: Where do you watch porn?
Answer: On a computer.
Next time you get the urge to jerk it, take a break from being on
your computer and go do something else – the urge will often
subside when you remove yourself from that environment.

6. Pay a friend $100 if you slip up and watch porn

A final strategy that has worked EXTREMELY well for me in the
past (for quitting any bad habit) is to tell a close friend that you’ll
pay them $100 if you slip up. Just ask them to check in on you once
per week.
If you go this route, be committed to actually following through
and paying your friend if you slip up (go with $20 or $50 if $100 is
more than you can tolerate). Otherwise it will not be effective.



Chapter 5 - I am Innocent

24 Killer Actions to Boost Your Self-Confidence

Note: Like you... I am innocent... just one click then it come
another... from that another came few mroe...

and in the end came a craving for that content... it's a strange
desire within you... within your brain.


Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder,
spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit.
– E.E. Cummings

BY LEO BABAUTA

One of the things that held me back from pursuing my dreams for
many years was fear of failure … and the lack of self-confidence
that I needed to overcome that fear.
It’s something we all face, to some degree, I think. The key
question: how do you overcome that fear?
By working on your self-confidence and self-esteem. Without
really thinking of it in those terms, that’s what I’ve been doing over
the years, and that’s what helped me finally overcome my fears, and
finally pursue my dreams.
I still have those fears, undoubtedly. But now I know that I can
beat them, that I can break through that wall of fear and come out
on the other side. I’ve done it many times now, and that success will
fuel further success.
This post was inspired by reader Nick from Finland, who asked for
an article about self-worth and self-confidence:
Many of the things you propose make people feel better about
themselves and actually help building self-confidence. However, I
would be interested on reading your input in general on this topic.
Taking time out for your own plans and dreams, doing things
another way than most other people and generally not necessarily
“fitting in” can be quite hard with a low self-confidence.
Truer words have never been spoken. It’s near impossible to make
time for your dreams, to break free from the traditional mold, and
to truly be yourself, if you have low self-esteem and self-confidence.
As an aside, I know that some people make a strong distinction
between self-esteem and self-confidence. In this article, I use them
interchangeably, even if there is a subtle but perhaps important
difference … the difference being whether you believe you’re worthy
of respect from others (self-esteem) and whether you believe in
yourself (self-confidence). In the end, both amount to the same
thing, and in the end, the actions I mention below give a boost to
both self-esteem and self-confidence.

Taking control of your self-confidence

If you are low in self-confidence, is it possible to do things that will

change that? Is your self-confidence in your control?
While it may not seem so, if you are low in self-confidence, I
strongly believe that you can do things to increase your self-
confidence. It is not genetic, and you do not have to be reliant on
others to increase your self-confidence. And if you believe that you
are not very competent, not very smart, not very attractive, etc. …
that can be changed.
You can become someone worthy of respect, and someone who
can pursue what he wants despite the naysaying of others.
You can do this by taking control of your life, and taking control
of your self-confidence. By taking concrete actions that improve
your competence, your self-image, you can increase that self-
confidence, without the help of anyone else.
Below, I outline 25 things that will help you do that. None of
them is revolutionary, none of them will do it all by themselves. The
list certainly isn’t comprehensive. These are just some of my favorite
things, stuff that’s worked for me.
And you don’t need to do all of them, as if this were a recipe …
pick and choose those that appeal to you, maybe just a couple at
first, and give them a try. If they work, try others. If they don’t, try
others.
Here they are, in no particular order:


1. Groom yourself. This seems like such an obvious one, but it’s
amazing how much of a difference a shower and a shave can make
in your feelings of self-confidence and for your self-image. There
have been days when I turned my mood around completely with this
one little thing.

2. Dress nicely. A corollary of the first item above … if you dress
nicely, you’ll feel good about yourself. You’ll feel successful and
presentable and ready to tackle the world. Now, dressing nicely
means something different for everyone … it doesn’t necessarily
mean wearing a $500 outfit, but could mean casual clothes that are
nice looking and presentable.


4. Think positive. One of the things I learned when I started
running, about two years ago, what how to replace negative
thoughts (see next item) with positive ones. How I can actually
change my thoughts, and by doing so make great things happened.
With this tiny little skill, I was able to train for and run a marathon
within a year. It sounds so trite, so Norman Vincent Peale, but my
goodness this works. Seriously. Try it if you haven’t.

5. Kill negative thoughts. Goes hand-in-hand with the above
item, but it’s so important that I made it a separate item. You have
to learn to be aware of your self-talk, the thoughts you have about
yourself and what you’re doing. When I was running, sometimes my
mind would start to say, “This is too hard. I want to stop and go
watch TV.” Well, I soon learned to recognize this negative self-talk,
and soon I learned a trick that changed everything in my life: I would
imagine that a negative thought was a bug, and I would vigilantly be
on the lookout for these bugs. When I caught one, I would stomp on
it (mentally of course) and squash it. Kill it dead. Then replace it with
a positive one. (“C’mon, I can do this! Only one mile left!”)

Know yourself and you will win all battles. – Sun Tzu

6. Get to know yourself. When going into battle, the wisest
general learns to know his enemy very, very well. You can’t defeat
the enemy without knowing him. And when you’re trying to
overcome a negative self-image and replace it with self-confidence,
your enemy is yourself. Get to know yourself well. Start listening to
your thoughts. Start writing a journal about yourself, and about the
thoughts you have about yourself, and analyzing why you have such
negative thoughts. And then think about the good things about
yourself, the things you can do well, the things you like. Start
thinking about your limitations, and whether they’re real limitations
or just ones you’ve allowed to be placed there, artificially. Dig deep
within yourself, and you’ll come out (eventually) with even greater
self-confidence.

7. Act positive. More than just thinking positive, you have to put it
into action. Action, actually, is the key to developing self-confidence.
It’s one thing to learn to think positive, but when you start acting on
it, you change yourself, one action at a time. You are what you do,
and so if you change what you do, you change what you are. Act in
a positive way, take action instead of telling yourself you can’t, be
positive. Talk to people in a positive way, put energy into your
actions. You’ll soon start to notice a difference.

8. Be kind and generous. Oh, so corny. If this is too corny for you,
move on. But for the rest of you, know that being kind to others, and
generous with yourself and your time and what you have, is a
tremendous way to improve your self-image. You act in accordance
with the Golden Rule, and you start to feel good about yourself, and
to think that you are a good person. It does wonders for your self-
confidence, believe me.

One important key to success is self-confidence. A key to self-
confidence is preparation. – Arthur Ashe

9. Get prepared. It’s hard to be confident in yourself if you don’t
think you’ll do well at something. Beat that feeling by preparing
yourself as much as possible. Think about taking an exam: if you
haven’t studied, you won’t have much confidence in your abilities to
do well on the exam. But if you studied your butt off, you’re
prepared, and you’ll be much more confident. Now think of life as
your exam, and prepare yourself.

10. Know your principles and live them. What are the principles
upon which your life is built? If you don’t know, you will have
trouble, because your life will feel directionless. For myself, I try to
live the Golden Rule (and fail often). This is my key principle, and I
try to live my life in accordance with it. I have others, but they are
mostly in some way related to this rule (the major exception being to
“Live my Passion”). Think about your principles … you might have
them but perhaps you haven’t given them much thought. Now think
about whether you actually live these principles, or if you just believe
in them but don’t act on them.

11. Speak slowly. Such a simple thing, but it can have a big
difference in how others perceive you. A person in authority, with
authority, speaks slowly. It shows confidence. A person who feels
that he isn’t worth listening to will speak quickly, because he doesn’t
want to keep others waiting on something not worthy of listening to.
Even if you don’t feel the confidence of someone who speaks slowly,
try doing it a few times. It will make you feel more confident. Of
course, don’t take it to an extreme, but just don’t sound rushed
either.

13. Increase competence. How do you feel more competent? By
becoming more competent. And how do you do that? By studying
and practicing. Just do small bits at a time. If you want to be a more
competent writer, for example, don’t try to tackle the entire
profession of writing all at once. Just begin to write more. Journal,
blog, write short stories, do some freelance writing. The more you
write, the better you’ll be. Set aside 30 minutes a day to write (for
example), and the practice will increase your competence.

14. Set a small goal and achieve it. People often make the
mistake of shooting for the moon, and then when they fail, they get
discouraged. Instead, shoot for something much more achievable. Set
a goal you know you can achieve, and then achieve it. You’ll feel
good about that. Now set another small goal and achieve that. The
more you achieve small goals, the better you’ll be at it, and the
better you’ll feel. Soon you’ll be setting bigger (but still achievable)
goals and achieving those too.

15. Change a small habit. Not a big one, like quitting smoking.
Just a small one, like writing things down. Or waking up 10 minutes
earlier. Or drinking a glass of water when you wake up. Something
small that you know you can do. Do it for a month. When you’ve
accomplished it, you’ll feel like a million bucks.

16. Focus on solutions. If you are a complainer, or focus on
problems, change your focus now. Focusing on solutions instead of
problems is one of the best things you can do for your confidence
and your career. “I’m fat and lazy!” So how can you solve that? “But I
can’t motivate myself!” So how can you solve that? “But I have no
energy!” So what’s the solution?

17. Smile. Another trite one. But it works. I feel instantly better
when I smile, and it helps me to be kinder to others as well. A little
tiny thing that can have a chain reaction. Not a bad investment of
your time and energy.

18. Volunteer. Related to the “be kind and generous” item above,
but more specific. It’s the holiday season right now … can you find
the time to volunteer for a good cause, to spread some holiday
cheer, to make the lives of others better? It’ll be some of the best
time you’ve ever spent, and an amazing side benefit is that you’ll feel
better about yourself, instantly.

 19. Be grateful. I’m a firm believer in gratitude, as anyone who’s
been reading this blog for very long knows well. But I put it here
because while being grateful for what you have in life, for what
others have given you, is a very humbling activity … it can also be a
very positive and rewarding activity that will improve your self-
image. Read more.

20. Exercise. Gosh, I seem to put this one on almost every list. But
if I left it off this list I would be doing you a disservice. Exercise has
been one of my most empowering activities in the last couple years,
and it has made me feel so much better about myself.
All you have to do is take a walk a few times a week, and you’ll see
benefits. Start the habit.

21. Empower yourself with knowledge. Empowering yourself, in
general, is one of the best strategies for building self-confidence. You
can do that in many ways, but one of the surest ways to empower
yourself is through knowledge. This is along the same vein as
building competence and getting prepared … by becoming more
knowledgeable, you’ll be more confident … and you become more
knowledgeable by doing research and studying. The Internet is a
great tool, of course, but so are the people around you, people who
have done what you want, books, magazines, and educational
institutions.

22. Do something you’ve been procrastinating on. What’s on your
to-do list that’s been sitting there? Do it first thing in the morning,
and get it out of the way. You’ll feel great about yourself.

23. Get active. Doing something is almost always better than not
doing anything. Of course, doing something could lead to mistakes
… but mistakes are a part of life. It’s how we learn. Without
mistakes, we’d never get better. So don’t worry about those. Just do
something. Get off your butt and get active — physically, or active by
taking steps to accomplish something.

24. Work on small things. Trying to take on a huge project or task
can be overwhelming and daunting and intimidating for anyone,
even the best of us. Instead, learn to break off small chunks and
work in bursts. Small little achievements make you feel good, and
they add up to big achievements. Learn to work like this all the time,
and soon you’ll be a self-confident maniac.

25. Clear your desk. This might seem like a small, simple thing
(then again, for some of you it might not be so small). But it has
always worked wonders for me. If my desk starts to get messy, and
the world around me is in chaos, clearing off my desk is my way of
getting a little piece of my life under control. It is the calm in the
center of the storm around me. Here’s how.

Somehow I can’t believe that there are any heights that can’t be
scaled by a man who knows the secrets of making dreams come true.
This special secret, it seems to me, can be summarized in four C s.
They are curiosity, confidence, courage, and constancy, and the
greatest of all is confidence. When you believe in a thing, believe in it
all the way, implicitly and unquestionable. – Walt Disney




6 Mental Hacks to Be More Confident in Yourself


On my first day at the FBI Academy, I didn’t feel like a superhero.
In fact it wasn’t until after four grueling months of being placed in
dangerous and awkward situations that I built the self-confidence
necessary for my career. Boosting confidence is the primary goal of
the Academy—before they send agents out with a gun and badge.
There were days when my heart raced and my palms sweat just
thinking about the new challenges that faced me. But I learned that
success would not make me confident—confidence in myself and my
abilities would make me successful.

On the first day, I was filled with doubt. I had never shot a gun,
made an arrest or investigated a foreign spy—these challenges
pushed me outside my comfort zone. I felt like I was at the mercy of
the unknown, not knowing how I would land on my feet. But I held
onto my dream of becoming an agent and plodded forward.
I’d venture to guess entrepreneurs, leaders and business owners
might share some of the same fears I faced at the FBI Academy: How
can I pull this off? But in my 24 years in the FBI, the only four-letter
word I didn’t hear was “can’t.”

Confidence is the cornerstone of leadership. If you don’t believe in
yourself, how can others believe in you? Here are seven ways FBI
agents learn to boost their confidence—mental hacks you can use to
be more confident in yourself, too:

1. Push through self-limiting beliefs.

As children we think we can conquer the world, but somewhere
between childhood and adulthood, our enthusiasm and natural
inclinations to dream big are squashed. Parents and teachers start
imposing their own beliefs—about what we can and can’t do in life—
upon us.
If the instructors at the FBI Academy were not pushing us past our
self-limiting beliefs, they weren’t doing their job.


Note: School is going to fuck you up... shake you up...


2. Never confuse memory with facts.

Our memory does not store information exactly as it’s presented
to us. Instead we extract the gist of the experience and store it in
ways that makes the most sense to us. That’s why different people
witnessing the same event often have different versions.
Your brain has a built-in confirmation bias. That means it stores
information that is consistent with your own beliefs, values and self-
image. This selective memory system helps keep the brain from
getting overloaded with too much information.
So recognize that your memory does not always provide you with
accurate information. For example if you have low self-esteem, your
brain tends to store information that confirms your lack of
confidence. That will be all you remember about a specific event.


3. Think positive to overcome your negativity bias.
Since the early days, humans learned to get lunch or be lunch.
Our natural negativity bias has kept us safe from danger for
thousands of years. But not every new or different thing is a threat
to our survival. This negativity bias can chisel away at our confidence
because we’re hardwired to pay attention to all that we’ve done
wrong.

FBI agents are taught to hunt the good stuff. It can be hard at
times because positive information is like Teflon and easily falls
away. But negative information, like Velcro, sticks.


4. Raise your curiosity levels.
Curiosity is an important trait for FBI agents working
investigations and anyone who wants to be confident and successful.
Curiosity is the foundation of life-long growth. If we remain
curious, we remain teachable and our minds and hearts grow larger
every day. We can retain our beginner’s mind by always looking
forward and discovering new experiences and uncovering new
information.


5. Overcome self-doubt.
If you lack self-confidence, you will always feel like you’re at the
mercy of other people. When you assume a victim mentality, you are
no longer resilient to life’s inevitable obstacles and roadblocks.
FBI agents go where they are needed, not to where they feel most
comfortable. I was assigned investigations I had no idea how to
solve. But my thinking was this: Drop me into the middle of any
squad or any situation, anywhere, anytime. I will not be scared
because I am confident I will succeed wherever I am.

6. Face your fears.
When we feel in control, we're not afraid. When we have a level of
comfort with something, it's not scary. When we don’t feel in control,
we don’t think clearly because our emotional brain is in the driver’s
seat and takes over. This is why fear often seems random and
irrational—our emotions are in control.
To increase safety, FBI agents are taught to move closer to the
threat. It does no good to avoid, deny or ignore the fear.


Note: It's like a chain reaction first it came the thought that by
watching it will make you feel great... you don't overthink here... you
don't analysis it... you just do what you desire... but then it comes
guilt and shame... after that... THAT'S WHEN THE HOLLY GREATNESS
OF OVERTHINKING COMES... YOU DID THAT!?... HOW COULD YOU DO
THAT? WHY THAT?
...

It floods your brain with thoughts... byitself depression and
anxiety staying alone home is not the way this riddle is going to
solved.



Your Thoughts Create Your Beliefs


Note: Let's say

Saying


if you do that

Btw:This person is "You" and on this smartphone you
have access to pornographic material.


This leads to watching that



Nudity and Action










Then comes something rough



Note: Okay this is cool... but let's ruin it


...

Check it out how I ruin it!




P.S. - Expresson of not liking that... by seeing that expression it
means that all this behavior and thoughts - AIN"T GOOD BRO!



P.S. - Ohh god she vomits... it's fucked up!?

...



P.S. - I fucking love this porn...

not from POV OF how boys treat girls... so... look

...

What's so fucking sexual in this?

...

If you have following me up to here... this will be enough if you are

sane... right now... right this moment... and fully focused... you
gonna see how disgusting is the whole image.


 VOMIT... deep throat with vomiting

P.S. - She is screaming... so let's say this is 50 Shades of Grey in
REAL WORLD




They are doing that... because in most cases... as it was said in
my previous book

Brain On Porn Volume 1... they are on drugs




There is something wrong about this image... look carefully




He is monster


Nope... kinda.... he is most likely an actor... or that's what
pornographic industry wants us to belief




She doesn't like it


...

VERY ABUSIVE!



1) Girl Calm
2) Girl Worry




Note: She is so sweet and how she does end up here?

...

Let me bright your day... fake promises

...

Better Life
Plenty of money
Easy Job


...

Or that's too much...

more likely

somebody has manipulated her and she has ended up here.

Note: Not horny at all




Note: Worried?



Note: FEAR, too much?

Note: Trying to be calm




Note: ANd it 's over



Note: Just tooooo much!





P.S. - You are saying no more... no more!

- NOPE!

...

Vomit is gross... imagine pizza with vomit



That on pizza

...

It's vomit!




Slibbed
slucked


...

Imagine that poonsh of vanillia eating


Uhggg lovely

...

Try it




Pizza with that
Ice Cream with that

...

Just imagine it


Water with that
All of your food with that
Your coffe with that
...

All what you love to eat and drink with that

just image it

...

(TIME FOR NEW MINDSET)



That's damn rough





I bet that she had a salad... a green one




Spoonsh offf...

aka miserable



I am not a psychologist but this is fake smile

...

Ohhaa



What's that?

>..

Bitching
Lil Bitch

"Hey I am miserable and I am fucked up..."
??




Too much is jusst too much... don't look me... look her

...

she is insane not me!



Sad

...

it was like facial abuse is cool... but then it happen that

...

Ughhh... blowjob

ughh... awful!




This is shitty


...



Ughh...

ughhhh


...

This is crazy!




Ohh god... she gonna snord


...


So this images have purpose... to demotivate you watching porn...
that's how i stopped porn...


1) I focused on the negative side of porn

aka this


- If this doesn't de-motivate you... you brother... you are in deep
shit.

 ...

Me

since 13 years old on the porn... and look me after 6 years... this
side is over once and for all.








Have you ever wondered where your beliefs come from? They
don’t just pop into your head out of thin air. The beliefs you have
about anything in your life are created over a period of time through
a consistent way of thinking. You could think of your mind as a big
cave, filled with different caverns.

Your beliefs are truths that have been formed by a constant
trickle of thoughts through your mind, depositing their positive,
negative and indifferent impressions as they run through, like
stalactites and stalagmites in your head. Over here, your beliefs
about love, sex, marriage, children and family. In the corner are
politics, religion and the unbelievable hairpiece your boss wears.
Scattered throughout your mind are thousands of these imaginary
formations—giant, tiny, positive, negative and everything in between,
each being built from slow, steady drips of your constant thoughts.
Some beliefs have grown quite large over time and are practically
indestructible, as if they were, well, set in stone. Some are thin
around the base and can be broken easily. This mind-cave is a crude
metaphor, but it illustrates how a constant trend in your thoughts
can grow into beliefs that can’t be eroded. Sometimes that’s a good
thing.
If your beliefs were shaped by positive streams of thought, you’d
be left with positive beliefs, monuments to your ability to overcome,
achieve and succeed. Sometimes the beliefs you build can be
crippling, though. Negative thoughts create beliefs rooted in
negativity, like teeth in a dooming bear trap of your own design. In
other words, beliefs are thoughts that you keep thinking over and
over.

Right now, you may be thinking that many of your beliefs were
influenced or even forced upon you when you were young—by your
parents, teachers, religious leaders, whoever—and that you didn’t
really have a choice in the matter.
The fact is that even if your beliefs were forced upon you by other
people, they were still registered into your mind by way of your
thought process. They cannot get there any other way. It really
makes no difference who or what the original source is.

The point is, if your brain is being bombarded by a barrage of
toxic thoughts on a consistent basis, you can be sure that an
unhealthy belief system is being created. Your beliefs write the story
of your life.
I have you thinking now… don’t I?





Chapter 6 - Strategy

That's how you do it

1) First you read the first volume


Do this exercise

focus on push ups, squats and all home activies which you can do


...

and put on pornography on


2) All this desires which you desire to watch
3) Focus only and only on activies... let the porn be a background
4) Do it ... more and more and more
5) Start going over this book if needed go few times... the images
should be enough to stopping you from any activies...


alll this information should make you buckle up for out of being
in porn cinema....



Part 2

DDUmp

BITCH
Chapter 7- IBC

It's IBC


Take it like this... this addiction with masturbation won't take you
far... it

Won't improve your life

Make you feel better
Won't put you in higher postion
Won't make you more productive
Won't remove stress
Won't make you feel happy
Won't stop self-pity yourself

- You can continue this book and don't do anything... but if you
ain't gonna do anything... just stop here

...

Choose another book... you still have time... keep your addiction in
your pockets if you want improvement.

Start by creating healty habbits

...

See Porn as:

Brutal
Fake Love
 Idiot Costume (If you masturbate all are going to see you in idiot
costume... - self-image)
Abusive
Sex Traffic

Chapter 8 - Try

10 Reasons Why You Should Quit Watching Porn



With the ubiquity and easy access to porn these days, it shouldn’t
come as a surprise that people are beginning to study the effects of it
on our sex lives. According to a website called projectknow.com, 420
million web pages are dedicated to porn, meaning the non-porn
Internet roughly consists of..well, Wikipedia. Scientists at Cambridge
University recently studied the brain scans of porn addicts and found
that they looked exactly like those of drug addicts. With such an
inexhaustible supply of porn at our disposal, there is a growing
concern that it is beginning to affect our brains, our relationships,
and even our bodies (beyond, of course, your mother’s idle threats of
blindness and hairy palms). A recent survey of a Reddit community
called NoFap, which is committed to abstaining from porn and
masturbation, has helped researchers open the door to a better
understanding of the effects of pornography on our lives. While the
results are not entirely conclusive, there are certainly some statistics
that should give a moment’s pause. Here are some of the reasons
why it may be a good idea to stick to Netflix next time you open up
your laptop:

1. For those addicted to porn, arousal actually declined with the

same mate. Those who regularly found different mates were
able to continue their arousal. It’s known as the Coolidge Effect,
or a tendency toward novelty-seeking behavior. Porn, after all,
trains the viewer to expect constant newness.
2. One in five people who regularly watch porn admitted to
feeling controlled by their own sexual desires.
3. 12 percent of NoFappers report watching five or more hours
of Internet porn every week. 59 percent report watching between
four and fifteen (!!) hours of porn every week.
4. Almost 50 percent of those on NoFap have never had sex in
their lives, meaning their only experience with intimacy is purely
digital.
5. 42 percent of male college students report visiting porn sites
regularly.
6. 53 percent of the NoFappers had developed a regular porn
habit between the ages of 12 and 14. An alarming 16 percent
said they started watching before they were 12.
7. 64 percent report that their tastes in porn have become more
 extreme or deviant.
8. Among 27- to 31-year-olds on NoFap: 19 percent suffer
from premature ejaculation, 25 percent are disinterested in sex
with their partner, 31 percent have difficulty reaching orgasm,
and 34 percent experience erectile dysfunction.
9. After committing to no masturbation/porn, 60 percent of
those on NoFap felt that their sexual functions had improved.
10. And 67 percent had an increase in energy levels as well as
productivity.

So there it is, men. While the evidence may not be scientifically
thorough, there’s certainly enough to suggest that porn has a
negative impact on our lives. It might be a good time to give that
overworked hand some rest, or, at the very least, use it to dial the
phone number of a real live human woman and ask her out on a
date.


What Are The Main Benefits of Quitting Porn?



If you haven’t already, check out our article on how porn
addiction is holding you back. We are very passionate about the fact
that porn literally ruins a lot of men’s lives in this generation. There
are too many reasons to list to stop watching porn, but here are the
top ten.
**Note: We’re not religious. We don’t judge. We’ve been avid porn
fans for most of our lives. But we just know the benefit of living a life
without it and want you to experience it too.
**Note 2: Not all men have a problem with porn. Some can watch
it when they want and lead healthy successful lives and crush it with
the ladies. But if it holds you back (with women or in general), even a
little, then this is something to think about.

1) The best version of yourself doesn’t watch porn

I know he’s not a real man, but do you think the character James
Bond was watching porn in between killing bad guys and slaying
gorgeous women? Do you think George Clooney and Brad Pitt were
spending hours streaming porn and fapping in their trailers on the
set on Ocean’s 13.
There’s not a chance.
Guys who live lives that you envy, get girls you want, and carry
themselves like you should, don’t waste their time jerking off to
internet porn. They are ambitious. They approach women and are
smooth when they do so. The best version of you can be like this. Or
you can turn to your laptop when you get aroused. Up to you. Let’s
get to the benefits of quitting porn no two…
2) Porn makes you lazy


Men no longer have to make any attempt at fulfilling
there sexuality. It is the worst thing that ever happened to the race.
Men used to go out of their way to win the hearts of women they
wanted. They used to be romantic and bold. Now they just stay
home and spend countless hours jerking off to internet porn instead.


3) Porn strips you of your desire for improvement

There is no reason to go to they gym. There is no reason to do
your hair and make yourself look good. Porn will never reject you no
matter how you look, and regardless of how much money you make.
When there is no primal need to impress the opposite sex in order to
fill mans instinctive need for lust, men let themselves go and lurk
their house in their underwear.

4) Porn causes insecurity

Porn sets unrealistic standards for men. To be in porn men
must have abnormally large “talent.” Men who watch porn
consistently grow to see that as the norm and themselves as
inadequate.
It’s a slippery slope because this insecurity keeps men from having
sex with women, in turn driving them deeper into porn use.

5) Many men find porn more stimulating then sex

Porn is now so fantastically HD, with every sexual fantasy
imaginable at the click of a mouse. The pleasure of watching porn is
starting to overtake the pleasure of actual sex, if it hasn’t already
done so.
Men searching hundreds of fetishes and videos in the matter of an
hour now find sex with a woman of the standard they can get
(because of the porn) boring, and unpleasurable.
This is a very dangerous line, as seen in the examples below.


I could link you 100 + examples easy, of just men who write about
it online. If this sounds like you you really need to sort yourself out.
Get on the forums, there are many people who have been through
the same thing who can help you along the way.

6) Porn causes ED

Because of reason 4 and 5, porn causes erectile dysfunction in an
enormous amount of men. Porn becomes the only thing that can
stimulate them because of the intense visual experience it offers the
brain. This experience is unnatural, and real sex become bland and
un-stimulating.


The experience of porn is so unnatural, that it actually causes the
brain to release unnatural amounts of Dopamine, the reward
chemical. The brain becomes so accustom to this unnatural level of
Dopamine that without porn you can not achieve an erection and
you straight feel like crap.
It is a proven fact that porn affects the brain the exact same way
as other addictive drugs. Educate yourself on the matter.

7) You will find women more attractive

I think the greatest gift of living a porn free is how you start to
perceive women around you. After months free of porn, your
attraction to women will go through the roof. It is truly remarkable.
– Just the sight of a woman’s skin will turn you on

Being free of porn you start to really appreciate the beauty of
women. Just the sight of a woman’s skin, or her smell will be enough
to throw your attraction into overdrive. Your sexual instincts will be
back where they are supposed to be, and you will crave women like
never before.

– You will start to notice women you once found unattractive

Women that once were not up to your porn standards really start
to pop out at you. You will start to see the beauty in women that
you once overlooked because they did not have the bodies of porn
stars. I find myself more and more surprised at some of the women I
find attractive and for what reasons. Its is really a beautiful thing.

8) You will be better with women

This should be reason enough for anyone to stop watching
internet porn. I promise you that after months of no porn, and even
better, no masturbation, you will be better with women (out of
necessity!). And not just a little better, but a lot better.

– You will crave women, instead of craving your favorite videos

Have you ever gotten that incredible sexual urge that comes out
of nowhere. To a regular porn viewer to first thing they do is head to
the internet. To men who don’t watch porn, the first thing they do is
head to their cell phone to call a real girl. Or they go out and meet
one.

 – You will find it easier to talk to women

Many men who give up porn find that they start to interact much
smoother with women. A lot of their anxiety towards the opposite
sex fades and they start to feel more confident and smooth.

9) Sex will be more satisfying

Instead of having ED and not finding sex as satisfying as porn,
you will be the opposite. After months without porn in your life your
pleasure for sex will skyrocket.
– You will have better, harder erections with women
Without porn numbing your sexual stimulation, just the touch of
a woman will be enough to get you up and going. Actual sex will feel
so different than it ever did. So much more powerful and
pleasurable.
– Your intimacy levels during sex will be something that you never
experienced before
If you are like most men who started porn at an extremely young
age, you have probably never even experienced intense intimacy. You
have sexually numbed yourself from porn for years, and your first
sexual experience free from porn will be like a sexual awakening.
You will also be much better at sex itself. You will be more in
touch with a woman’s body, and your own. You won’t have any
performance anxiety issues and your sexual freedom and spirituality
will increase.

Sex can be the greatest experience there is, you just need to lose
the porn. I would quit porn just for this benefit alone!

10) You will simply be a better version of yourself

Its a fact that if you can give up porn you will be a better version
of yourself.
– You will think clearer and be less stressed
– You will find women more attractive
– You will be better with women
 – Your sex life will improve
– You will have more energy
Try it. If it doesn’t work, porn will be waiting for you right where
you left it.
Chapter 9 - InsiGHT

"Quitting isn't a cure all for your life problems – but it's the
foundation, a ploughed field in which you can sow seeds for a new
future that isn't bedevilled by the secrecy and shame that comes with
falling into the seemingly inescapable pit of porn-related despair
that so many of us know. A life of hope and strength

– not jizzy tissues, jealousy, bitterness, self-hatred, resentment and

unfulfilled dreams.
In the light of this vast, informal experiment, it seems clear that the
widely held view of clinicians that pornography, specifically online
pornography, is harmless should be reconsidered as a matter of
urgency. We can’t be sure that the thousands of people describing
their recovery from excessive porn use are mistaken.
As we'll see next, it is quite plausible that the symptoms they
describe are real, that online pornography use causes them, and that
behavioural change can bring significant benefits. In any case, porn
users suffering from the kinds of symptoms outlined above have
little to lose from cutting out internet porn for a few months to see if
their symptoms resolve."

via Brain On Porn Book by Gary Wilson



"Obviously, human mating is generally more complex. For one
thing we're among the peculiar 3 to 5 percent of mammals with the
capacity for long-term bonds. Yet sexual novelty can enthral us too."

via Brain On Porn Book by Gary Wilson



"This ancient reward circuitry compels you to do things that
further your survival and pass on your genes. At the top of our
human reward list are food,[42] sex,[43] love,[44] friendship, and
novelty.[45] These are called ‘natural reinforcers,’ as contrasted with
addictive chemicals (which can hijack this same circuitry).
The evolutionary purpose of dopamine is to motivate you to do what
serves your genes.[46] The bigger the squirt the more you want
something. No dopamine and you just ignore it. High-calorie
chocolate cake and ice cream – a big blast. Celery – not so much.
Dopamine surges are the barometer by which you determine the
value of any experience. They tell you what to approach or avoid,
and where to put your attention. Further, dopamine tells you what to
remember by helping to rewire your brain.[47] Sexual
stimulation and orgasm add up to the biggest natural blast of
dopamine available to your reward circuitry.
Although dopamine is sometimes referred to as the ‘pleasure
molecule’, it's is actually about seeking and searching[48] for
pleasure, not pleasure itself. Thus dopamine rises with anticipation.
[49] It's your motivation and drive to pursue potential pleasure or
long term goals.[50]"


via Brain On Porn Book by Gary Wilson




"The pleasure of climax appears to arise from opioids, so think of
dopamine as wanting and opioids as liking.[51] As psychologist
Susan Weinschenk explained,[52] ‘dopamine causes us to want,
desire, seek out, and search’. Yet ‘the dopamine system is stronger
than the opioid system. We seek more than we are satisfied. ...
Seeking is more likely to keep us alive than sitting around in a
satisfied stupor."


via Brain On Porn Book by Gary Wilson



"Dopamine surges for novelty.[54] A new vehicle, just-released
film, the latest gadget…we are all hooked on dopamine. As with
everything new the thrill fades away as dopamine plummets. So, as
in the example above, the rat’s reward circuitry is squirting less and
less dopamine with respect to the current female, but produces a big
dopamine surge for a new female.
Does this sound familiar? When Australian researchers displayed the
same erotic film repeatedly, test subjects' penises and subjective
reports both revealed a progressive decrease in sexual arousal.[55]
The ‘same old same old’ just gets boring. Habituation indicates
declining dopamine. After 18 viewings – just as the test subjects were
nodding off – researchers introduced novel erotica for the 19th and
20th viewings. Bingo!"

via Brain On Porn Book by Gary Wilson

"Supernormal Stimulus

Erotic words, pictures and videos have been around a long time –as
has the neurochemical rush from novel mates. So what makes
today's porn."


Note: For what do you do that?

For what type of reason?

Note: When you start giving thought... why that... and why so...
that's the moment when your mind start fucking with you then it's
the moment "Okay... "but"..." or even "Okay... "but".... "if"... this are
words which start putting you right in your place. You wanna
change?

...


Stop living with thoughts

START DOING STUFF

Chapter 10 - The Secret (Part 1)

Note: The Secret!

5 Things to Do When She Doesn’t Text You Back






When I first started dating, nothing was more exciting than the
rush of flirting with a new girl over text. It always felt like the start
of something good.
I also remember that nothing was more nerve-racking than
waiting for a reply. And waiting. And when she never replied at all —
realizing that our connection was potentially dead in the water.
In hindsight, I spent WAY too much time stressing and analyzing
my rollercoaster of emotions. I’d check my phone constantly, worry
about whether or not I should send another text, and always wonder
WHY…why is she not talking to me?
Ten years later, I now know that worrying about it was a waste of
time. Unfortunately, there were no clear answers then and there are
no clear answers now.

So when guys reach out to me asking, “Why didn’t she text
back?” I can only make educated guesses about a woman’s
motivations. There are countless reasons a girl goes MIA.
The point is, my advice will always be to…
Stop dwelling on the fact that she hasn’t responded. Instead,
focus on a plan of action to get the conversation going again.
To give you the best shot, I created a simple framework to follow
next time you don’t hear back from a girl you like.

1. Give her a day to reply before you send another text
 Assume that your message was delivered successfully. Unless your
phone says otherwise, it’s almost guaranteed that she received it.
Maybe she just hasn’t seen it yet. Maybe she did but she’s busy
with work, study, or something else in the real world. Maybe she is
waiting to respond because it’s not her top priority in the moment.
Maybe she’s playing coy. Or maybe she just became bored of the
conversation.

Regardless of the reason, hitting her up again within 24 hours
almost never yields good results.
When a woman is talking to a new guy, she’s cautious about the
situation. She wants to make sure you’re not too intense, needy, or
overly invested.
If she didn’t see the message and you ping her again, it feels
like you’re desperatefor a response.
If she did see the message and is waiting or choosing not to
respond, your follow-up often reinforces that she shouldn’t reply. It
feels overbearing and like you’ve got nothing better to do.

I’m not saying to pretend like you’re cool and aloof. Rather, I
want you to put yourself in the shoes of a confident man with
options who’s not seeking approval. He might think, “that sucks”
when he doesn’t get a reply…but then he’s going to focus on
something else. He’s going to be productive, hang out with friends,
do something fun for himself, and talk to other women.
He’s not sitting at home agonizing over the response time of a girl
he barely knows.
2. But don’t wait more than 2-3 days to text again
That said, a lot of guys go the opposite of intense messaging and
instead distance themselves completely. They decide not to message
for multiple days, weeks, or ever again — even if this was the first
time she went cold.

One reason guys do this is to avoid appearing needy and
desperate. But as I’ve said before, neediness comes down to your
mindset. If you genuinely want to connect with this girl and are
pulling away to manipulate her approval of you — you’re being
needy.
Another reason is that guys feel they put enough in effort and
now it’s the girl’s turn to respond. I wish the world worked like that.
Some women will reinitiate contact but many more, even ones that
are interested, won’t. If this is just the first time she’s stopped
responding, there’s no point in playing the waiting game and
potentially missing your window of opportunity.
Hit her up within a few days and follow the ideas below for your
message.
3. Don’t ask if she got your last text or talk about the same thing
I know you might feel lost when reinitiating with a girl who went
quiet. Your natural inclination may be to double check if she received
your message or repeat the same topic.

For example, perhaps she went silent after you asked her what
she’s doing on Thursday. You write something like…
“I guess sitting at home and not talking to anyone then =P”
[Making fun of her not answering]
“So what did you end up doing Thursday?” [Asking her after the
fact]
“Not sure if you got my last message but I was wondering what
your plans were for Thursday?” [Double checking]
These rarely ever work. Even when you think you’re being
sarcastic about her lack of reply, you’re coming off as passive-
aggressive and bitter.
This girl stopped responding after your last message FOR A
REASON. Pushing her to reply to that specific idea or checking on her
like you’re her dad isn’t exciting. It also makes it feel like you’re hung
up on why she didn’t respond.
4. Don’t immediately invite her out again
You also don’t want to invite her out as your first message back
to her. This is especially true if your previous unanswered text was
about trying to setup plans.

She may have not been comfortable enough or excited enough yet
to commit to a date. You pushing again without addressing those
feelings (through positive emotion, see below) will often yield
another silent response or no commitment.
It’s better to start with a more casual and engaging message,
have a few texts back and forth, and then invite her out when she’s
expressing positive emotions. Because if she went radio silent after
your first invitation, you have to make the second one count.
Women can feel awkward about telling a guy off twice. They
know you’re probably feeling rejected and frustrated which makes
them feel uncomfortable. In turn, they can pull back to avoid
confrontation or convince themselves it wasn’t meant to be. Then
they go back to ignoring you or tell you sorry, but they’re not
interested.

So why blow your chances by rushing it? Sending a couple more
playful messages will shift the vibe and make her feel more secure
about your connection. Here’s how you should be getting back into
conversation:
5. Get the positive emotions flowing and THEN invite her out
As I said earlier, women stop responding for many reasons. But it
usually comes down to that they’re not excited, invested, or
comfortable enough to meet up with you (basically a stranger) yet.
A lot of guys think the remedy is to talk about commonalities and
get to know each other on a deeper level. But women don’t want
that over text — it’s a horrible means for communication. She can do
that on a date with you.
All she really needs is to FEEL that it’s going to be a fun, awesome
experience meeting up with you.
If you just start up the conversation with something bland,
logical, or devoid of emotion — it’s not likely to go anywhere. This is
why messages like, “Hey, how’ve you been?”, “So did you do well on
the test?” fall flat. They don’t encourage her to open up and feel
something more.

You want her to experience positive emotions such as
enthusiasm, curiosity, playfulness, passion, and get her laughing her
ass off when she reads your texts. There are countless ways to do
this:
 Use more descriptive or emotional language even when talking
about normal things. Make everyday conversation more
intriguing. Use words that paint a picture or evoke powerful
responses.
“Btw, the new X album blew my mind, I think I just had an
audiogasm.” vs “Btw, that new X album is good.”
“I just shook my ass like Shakira at salsa. Getting into
anything exciting yourself?” vs “I just got back from salsa
class. What are you doing tonight?”
Add a funny GIF using iMessage/Whatsapp to enhance your
message. So for example on the salsa message, you could
then include a GIF of a cat shaking its body awkwardly.
Share something interesting about yourself. This could be a
situation that happened to you, an adventure you had, or an
idea/subject you’re passionate about.
Send a photo of you hiking at a beautiful lake, at a concert,
or in your new suit. You can attach a quick note to it like,
“I’m coming for you Daniel Craig.”
“I just spent the last 15 minutes wondering what my dog
was trying to tell me. I can’t be the only one, right?”
“Yeaaaah, finally got my SCUBA certification. Feel free to
picture me in my wetsuit.”
Ask a relevant question to her life, something you’re genuinely
curious about, or just something random/silly. When someone
asks a great questionabout a topic we’re passionate about, we
love to talk about it. And fun or thought-provoking questions
surprise and excite us to continue the dynamic conversation.
“So what inspired your bohemian-chic style? A memorable
trip?”
“You said you love to sketch — can you draw me like one of
your French girls?”
“What’s your most useless superhero power?”

If you haven’t noticed, there’s a theme here. All these messages
are concise (1-2 sentences max), lighthearted, and often contain a
joke.
 Humor is the quickest way to re-engage a girl and get her hooked
every time she reads your messages. And if she feels great chatting
with you over text, she won’t be able to wait to meet up with you in-
person.
Don’t wait long to make your move though. Once she’s
responding back a couple times positively, strike when the iron is hot
and invite her out.
These 5 steps will give you the best chance of bringing back a
dead conversation. But if you’ve tried all the above more than once
and she still hasn’t responded — it’s time to focus on someone else
whose more excited to connect with you.



What To Do If She Doesn’t Text Back



Some girls are, and always will be hard to get. Even if they are
not the most attractive girl in the room, they are still very high
status and good at playing the game. These are my favorite girls.
The ones that are hardest to get are the ones that are most
rewarding when you finally do get them. These are the girls who
take forever to respond to your texts, change plans on you several
times, stop answering your texts, and even stop talking to you for
weeks at a time. Just know you are not alone. They do this to
everyone, and most guys don’t know how to handle them . . . But I
do!
First you must recognize that she may in fact be very busy and
have a lot on her plate at the time; i.e. she may be working a ton of
hours more at work, she may be getting over her boyfriend whom
she recently broke up with, she may be feeling awful lately with
some kind of illness, it may be her time of month were she is just
moody and doesn’t want to talk to you.
Just like there are days where you don’t feel like going out, and
hanging out with girls, there are certainly many days where she feels
the same. And it’s just easier for her to not answer your text or your
Facebook message, than to explain that she doesn’t feel like talking
to guys that day. So don’t get too upset when she doesn’t
immediately reply, or if she never replies for that matter. You have to
realize that not every girl is going to like you.
The following three strategies are the perfect guide for getting
women to respond when all hope is lost. They’re the best-known
techniques for dealing with the conundrum of what to do if she
doesn’t text back!

Strategy 1

Something to try though that has historically worked pretty well
for reeling her back in if she doesn’t reply back to a text message is
to make a joke out of it. I got this from a close friend of mine who
was very clever with his text game. If a girl didn’t answer him, and he
was texting herabout some plans or asking her a question, after
about an hour or so, after he knew she saw it and was just ignoring
it, he would say something as simple as “K sounds good lol”. This, or
something like “Alright hun that sounds awesome lol”. A simple text
like that, calls her out in a funny way, and shows that it’s not really
a big deal to you that she didn’t answer, but that it’s more amusing
to you. A lot of the time, a girl will see this, and laugh. And she will
usually text back, and either apologize for not texting, or laugh and
answer the question from earlier. It’s very simple, but effective.

Strategy 2

Another thing that works well, if a girl either stops answering
texts, or is taking forever and you don’t know if she is going to reply
back, is to call her! That’s right, like the old days, before anyone ever
knew what a text message was; use the call feature!
Summon your deep inner, manly voice, and call her up!
Two things can either happen. She can either pick up the phone,
which would obviously solve your problem (though not really that
likely), or more probably, you will get her voicemail, and you will
leave her a cool message. This is very important, you must leave her
a fun, exciting, and powerful voicemail, not some lame, weak-
hearted voicemail about why she is not answering you. Say
something like “What’s up kiddo! I was just driving so I couldn’t
text…but yeah, I just saw the funniest thing ever that reminded me
of you. Let me know when get this; you’re going to laugh your ass
off, later!” Now this of course, is not applicable to every scenario, but
you get the message. Something that engages her, something that
could be funny if done correctly, and something that is not needy.

 Strategy 3

The final thing, and usually the last resort, depending on if you
use it before the voicemail technique or not, is to challenge her to
hang out with you. This is done via text. And this is done usually
after she has flaked on you, or if you just haven’t been able to get
together for one reason or another after trying for some time. What
you do is send a re-initiating text message like “Sup sweetheart…Are
you gonna’ hang out this week or are you gonna keep being a dink”.
Now, before you laugh, this is actually more intricate than meets the
eye. It does a few things all at once.
For one, it obviously calls her out on not being able to hang out
with you yet. For two, it most likely offends her in a comical, teasing
way, and shows her that you’re not afraid to say something like this
to her. But thirdly, and most importantly, it challenges her and
almost dares her to reply back to prove to you that she’s not
a “dink,” or whatever inflammatory synonym you can replace this
with; like a stiff, a square, a loser, a bum – personally I like to use
the word “dink” because it’s the funniest to me.


21 REAL Reasons She Won’t Call or Text Back



Every man has clicked with a woman he thought was awesome,
exchanged numbers with her, and then, SURPRISINGLY, never heard
from her again! It happens every day, every minute, and every
second and sometimes can’t be avoided no matter what you do.
From my experience with this situation, I can help you figure out
what’s happening when women quit answering, calling back, and
returning texts.



When She Won’t Call or Text Back, It’s Confusing, Frustrating, and
Annoying

It totally sucks when she’s not answering and calling or texting
you back and instead of playing it totally cool, like we should, most
of us freak out and lose our minds.
“What the f*ck! Did I do something wrong? Why the hell is this
happening? Did I miss something? Am I not good enough? Am I
overreacting? We start checking our phone more than normal and if
we hear a sound, we pull it out of our pocket or run to it hoping it’s
her calling or texting back! You know you’ve done it…
So when this happens, what’s really going on? It can be a real
pain to figure out.
To help you, here are 21 reasons women have for not calling or
texting back.
1. Life Happens and Things Change
Things come up, happen, and change in our lives that we don’t
expect.
Sometimes women really do like you and, out of the blue,
something makes her realize she needs to shift her priorities to more
than just “guys” and dating. Things like health, family, kids, ex
drama, career, death, loss of a friendship, etc. come up and she must
shift her mind, thinking, and focus to deal with it.
It’s not that she forgets about you. It’s that she becomes so
overwhelmed and involved in the situation that days and weeks can
go by before she realizes she hasn’t called or texted.

2. She’s Not Calling or Texting Back Because She’s Busy

From experience with women not calling or texting back, some
women actually do have very busy lives and they don’t live with their
cell phone in their hand.
Some women only take their cell phone out once or twice a day
and they usually keep it on vibrate or silent so it doesn’t distract
them from their busy schedule. They’ll return calls and reply to texts
at the end of the day but they’re not in the habit of calling and
texting 24/7. If you’re involved with someone like this, patience is
key. She’ll be impressed when you don’t freak out and have intense
reactions to it.


3. She Gave You Her Number To Be Polite

Having a pleasant conversation with you doesn’t always
guarantee she’s feeling attraction. She may just be enjoying the
conversation.
So, when you ask for her phone number, she may not want to be
rude “no” or that she’s not interested. She may just want to avoid
conflict and the headache of rejecting you.
A lot of women decide it’s easier to handle the “can I have your
number?” situation by just being polite, giving you her number, and
then ignoring your calls and texts.


4. She Doesn’t Call or Text Back Because Because She’s Bored

In How to Quit Being a Loser With Women, you’ll learn when I get
her number, I don’t call or text unless she texts first OR I’m calling or
texting to invite her out. I never call or text just to chat or make
small talk. Since I don’t know her very well, I’m taking the chance of
her getting bored and changing her mind about wanting to see or
talk to me again.
This happens with TONS of men. They call or text too much, make
boring small talk, and have nothing interesting to talk about with
her. All she is thinking is, “Wow, this dude is turning out to be pretty
lame.”
In turn, she gets bored and loses interest in calling or texting.
When she ignores your calls and texts, she figures you’ll eventually
get the hint and leave her alone.

5. She Won’t Call or Text Back Because She Lost Interest

Her chances of losing interest are very high if you don’t bring
enough excitement to the table. You now have to compete with the
games in her phone, Facebook, Instagram, etc.
That’s why, again, I don’t waste time texting, calling, and making
small talk. I only call or text if I’m inviting her out and I’m going to
see her face to face.
6. She Was Never Interested or Sure in the First Place
My ex-girlfriend gives her number out and rarely talks to the guy
she gave it to. We’re eating, her phones vibrating, beeping, and
ringing, and she’ll get annoyed at her phone.
I’ll ask, “Aren’t you going to text them back?” and she’ll say, “No.
It’s some guy I gave my phone number to and I decided I’m just
not interested or in him.”
As you can guess, I’m sitting there baffled, thinking, “Okay….”
She’s not the only girl who does it! A LOT of women do this!


7. She’s Not Calling or Texting Back Because She’s Ignoring You


Noticing a common thread?
She’s ignoring your calls, texts, and CONSCIOUSLY CHOOSING not
to text or call back.
You could think, “She’s an angel and there’s no way she’s mean or
rude enough to be ignoring my calls…” BUT, you’d be wrong.
Most women don’t see ignoring calls and texts as mean or rude.
They’re simply weeding out the weak and unattractive men.”
If you had 50 women calling and texting every single day and you
only were interested in 1 or 2, you’d ignore most of the calls in order
to manage your time. You’d figure the rest of the women you don’t
like as much will get the hint.

8. She Doesn’t Care About Your Feelings


Some women really are rude, inconsiderate, and don’t care about
your feelings and that really doesn’t make them bad people. It
means they just don’t think the same way as other women.
Remember what I said before: If she took the time to talk to every
guy that texted and called, she’d have no time for anything else. She
HAS TO ignore most phone calls and texts to protect her sanity and
time.

9. You’re Not The Only Guy She Talks To

No matter how great you think she is, you can bet your top dollar
that, even if she’s single, she’s already talking to or sleeping with
someone else.
It sounds terrible but this is the way many women operate.
She may find you attractive and interesting, BUT if you’re not
captivating her attention and causing her to feel more attraction for
you than the other guy(s) she’s already talking to, she’ll put you on
the bottom of her list and forget about you.
She has to be, even more, excited about YOU than she is about the
guys she’s already talking to.
If she’s not, you shouldn’t be expecting her to call and text you
back like she is.

 10. You Got Friend Zoned

The amazing friend zone is a place full of guys who she won’t call
or text back because they don’t know what they’re doing with
women – and now you’re stuck with them!
There are a ton of reasons women friend zone guys but the main
reason is always consistent – you didn’t make her feel enough
attraction for her to WANT to call and text you back.



11. She Won’t Call or Text Back Because You’re Just Like Other
Guys

Many of us are guilty of being boring, bland, predictable, asking
the same questions, saying the same things, etc. It doesn’t make her
excited to want to see you anymore or even call or text you back!
95% of guys she meets ARE the same and that’s why she friend
zones them and doesn’t call or text them back.
If you want to be part of the 5% of guys who ACTUALLY DO get
her attention, read this book.
 12. You Seemed Desperate
Women aren’t big fans of desperate guys.
It’s easy to seem overly happy, excited, needy, and clingy when we
really like her a lot and it can make us look desperate – even if we
aren’t.
This is a very dangerous place to be in.
Again, 99% of guys act the same way when they meet her and
she really wants the guy who doesn’t act needy, clingy, or desperate.
13. You Ask or Say Offensive / Inappropriate Things
People are more sensitive than ever and offended by absolutely
everything so, even though it’s not your fault, you have to more
careful and responsible about what you text or say to women.
I joked with a woman that she Photo-shopped her picture, clearly
she didn’t, and she didn’t speak to me for 6 months.

Offensive/inappropriate things that cause women to not want to
call or text you back:

1. Asking For Nudes – If you just met her or barely know her,
it’s risky to ask if she can snap a photo of her “snapper” and
send it to you.

1. Not Watching Your Language – Some women aren’t into

talking nasty or dirty on the phone. It’ll catch her totally off
guard and make her think you’re a pervert who only wants
sex.

1. Questions that Are Too Personal – Intimate questions about her

life or parts of her body will cause her to get uncomfortable and
stop calling and texting. Most women only open up to guys they
know well and are comfortable with.

14. You Call and Text Too Often


Sometimes we don’t realize we’re calling or texting too much and
once we do, it’s too late to do anything about it!
If you’re calling or texting too much, she’ll start ignoring your
calls and messages and not returning them.
How much should you call or text women?
This eBook, Texting Titan!, teaches you EXACTLY how much you
should and shouldn’t call and text her.

15. You Talk Too Much or Send WAY Too Many Texts

In Texting Titan!, you’ll learn it’s important to mirror her texts – if
she texts only a few words, you text a few words back. If she texts a
complete sentence, don’t text 3 paragraphs back. It creates an
“imbalance” and overwhelms her. I communicates you’re way more
excited to talk to her than she is to talk to you.
Appear to be as calm, cool, and laid back as she is.
Texting can be a game of chess – you have to carefully plan and
execute your next text and anticipate how she’ll receive and respond
to it before you send it.
16. You Over-Compliment Her and Kiss Her Ass
Another thing How to Quit Being a Loser With Women teaches
you is we LOGICALLY THINK women like lots of niceness and
compliments – but most of them get tired of it pretty quickly.
 Instead of building attraction, kissing her ass only causes her to
see you in the same light as all of the other guys who DO THE SAME
THING.
Women enjoy compliments, but not too soon and too often. Too
soon makes you seem fake. Too often makes you seem desperate for
approval.

17. You’re Getting Too Serious Too Fast

Some of us don’t know or understand how to smoothly,
gradually, and gracefully take things from one level to the next with
her. We like to shoot from the hip and take shortcuts.
Women are like cats and if you move too fast or make sudden
movements she’s not expecting, she’ll run and hide under the couch
for a week and only come out at night.
If you want her to continue calling and texting back, don’t start
talking about your feelings, getting emotional, and asking her how
she “feels” about you.
She’s looking to enjoy the process, not be cornered and put on the
spot by it.
18. You’re Too Open
If she knows everything about you and you’ve only known her a
few weeks/months, you’ve said TOO MUCH.
When there’s nothing left for her to wonder about or figure out,
the attraction will start to dissappear – leading to her not calling or
texting you back.
It’s important not to share your life story too soon and too often.
Some dating “experts” and “gurus” say being an open book is the
best way to go BUT IT’S NOT. Logically, it seems telling women
EVERYTHING causes them to like us MORE and feel more attraction –
but it has the opposite effect.
Women enjoy the mystery and the process of “getting to know
you”. Drag the process out as long as you can, keep her guessing and
wondering, and she’ll be waiting for your calls and texts.


19. You’re Too Silly and Send Too Many Emojis

We all know women like funny guys but there are very real
boundaries and limits with it.
If you’re too silly and joking around too often, she’ll label you as
a clown and decide to never call or text you back again.
Women also aren’t crazy about guys sending too many emojis
and emoticons.
Too many emojis communicates you’re trying way too hard to
prove you’re a nice guy.
It seems fake.
20. What You’re Saying Seems Too Good To Be True
Women say they want Mr. Prince Charming and the nicest and
sweetest guy in the world, but that’s not true either.
Most women will stop calling and texting if what you’re saying
sounds too good to be true or like complete bullshit.
If what you’re saying sounds, or is, scripted or rehearsed, she’ll
probably move on to another guy who’s more down to earth and
realistic.

21. You’re Trying to Sound “Too Smooth” or “Too Cool”

This kind of ties in with #20.
If you’re just too cool and smooth, she’ll sense something “off”
about you.
She knows there’s a normal level of being a cool guy and a fake
level of being a cool guy.
She’ll stop calling or texting because she’s skeptical and doesn’t
want to waste her time on someone who’s pretending to be someone
he’s not.

Conclusion

When she’s truly attracted and interested, IT DOESN’T MATTER
WHAT is happening in her life, SHE WILL FIND THE TIME to get back to
you.
When she isn’t calling or texting back, it’s best to accept the
reality of the situation and give it a break, or move on. Don’t waste
your time chasing women who aren’t interested.
If she asks you to stop calling and texting her, SHE USUALLY
MEANS IT! If you don’t stop, it’s called stalking and it makes you
a weird and creepy guy.
There’s millions and millions of single women all around the
world and you’ll find one who takes the time to call and text you
back. Especially if you work on becoming a better man every single
day.


Note: There is a chance for a better life
so here is what you can do

1. Stop porn (We already had chat on that and this whole book is
about this... you got in your hands to volumes of "Why" to stop
pornography at first time.
2. Stop doing what you "Should"
3. Start doing what you "Want"
 4. Stop with moving what you want today to do for tomorrow and
tomorrow and later and later... do it "NOW"
5. Start being playful...
6. If you are nice... it means you are Mr.Boring
7. Stop the Obsession, it will stop you from being clear in what you
should do
8. Stop the overthinking process... it fucks with your mind
9. Stop putting ranks on people, in other words it makes the whole
case worst than ever
10. Start Seeing yourself as successful

If a girl doesn't reply to some of your texts, does it always mean
she's not interested?

It really depends, there are number of reasons.

She's busy/doesn't feel like talking to anyone at the moment and

by the time she sees it, it's not relevant anymore.

-Do we have to learn X for this exam?

She sees the message after exam.
She doesn't know what to say to that. Maybe your questions
made her uncomfortable, maybe she knows you wouldn't like
the answer and she's having difficulties figuring out a way to say
that without hurting your feelings or sounding mean or she
doesn't know the answer yet.

-Do you like me?

She's thinking:
-You seem nice and I don't know how to tell you that I'm not
interested without hurting your feelings or ruin your confidence./
I really have no idea if I want something, but I don't want to say
no in case I decide I do, but I don't want to say yes since I'll be a
complete bitch if later I realize that it's in fact no.
She's not interested but won't completely ignore you since that
 wouldn't be polite.

She won't ask you any questions, gives short answers, or only
answers to some neutral questions.
She knows you wouldn't like the answer and hopes you'll get the
hint. You can check this by asking again, if she ignores it again,
then consider it to be something you don't want to hear.

-What are you wearing?

She's thinking:
-I'll just ignore and hope he'll take the hint and stop act like a
complete perv.

She's a person who uses text messages only for direct

communication, such as agreeing on meetings, telling someone
you're late, etc. She just doesn't use that for some chatting or
small talk.

She won't ask you any questions, gives short answers, or only
answers to some neutral questions, but she agrees on meeting
you and seems nice and approachable when you see each other.

16 Things Women Say That Men Misunderstand - Translated for His
Pleasure



Years ago I co-hosted a morning network talk show, a TV version
of the popular John Gray novel, Men Are From Mars ... Women Are
From Venus, along with friends Dr. Drew Pinsky, Cristina Ferrare,
Rondell Sheridan and Bo Griffin (RIP).
In the 100-or-so episodes that were broadcast, I covered many
cool topics relating to the differences in how the sexes communicate.
Gray's theory maintains that "men complain about problems because
they are asking for solutions while women complain about problems
because they want their problems to be acknowledged."
 Agreed. Both genders are guilty of misinterpreting each other's
words and actions because we speak two separate languages.
For example, when a man says "Not right now" it often translates
to, "Please go away" or "Leave me alone." Men need time-outs in their
caves until they find a solution to whatever they're figuring out, and
they don't want our help. There's no mystery in what they're saying,
it's to-the-point and straightforward. Men say what they mean.
The same doesn't apply to most women. Instead, they drop hints.
They beat around the bush. They expect men to know what they're
thinking. "I don't want to talk right now," is usually a passive way of
getting a guy to pay attention as a sort of test. In other words, she's
asking if he cares.
Confusing? Yes.
To top it off, women often expect men to be mind readers. When
they look away to avoid spilling tears, or they huff and they puff
and mutter under their breath, they're not happy. It's written all over
their faces, despite attempts to hide it.
To help men understand this "chick code," dudes need a tool to
help decipher ladies' glossary of terms. The following are
translations of the more common phrases men will hear coming out
of a woman's mouth:

1. Whatever. Truce. "I don't feel like fighting with you right now so
you and I should just agree to disagree." We say this when we don't
want to get into whatever it is you're bringing up.

2. Fine. Our way of ending a fight or preventing one from
starting. When we say "Fine" you should consider yourself lucky, say
"OK" and walk away. Just expect to hear about it later.

3. Oh, nothing. Definitely something. Except you are expected to
know what that something is. This is where the mind-reading comes
into play. If you still haven't telepathically figured out what's wrong
by time we bring it up, then you're in deep shit.

4. Do I look fat in this? Do NOT ever respond to this question with
a "Yes." What we're really asking is if we're desirable, if you're
attracted to us - not if you like our outfit. This is the moment you
should sweep your lady up in your arms and tell her how she'd look
hot even in a potato sack.

Can you see my cellulite? Decode before

you answer ...

5. Should I wear this... or this? We're asking, "Which outfit do I
look sexier in?" Given a choice, guys usually go for the get-up that
covers the most skin, (especially if you're off to lunch with his
mother). We know this, and usually go for the one you don't want us
wearing when it's girls' night out.

6. I'll be 5 minutes. Give us at least 20, and please don't harass us
during this process; it will only make us nervous and fuck up our
make-up, leading to at least another 5 minutes. This also can be
code for, "Go pour yourself a drink, have a seat and put the TV on
whatever it is you want to watch until I'm ready."

7. Can I just blow you? There's something funky going on
downstairs. Whether we're on our period, there's a yeast thing
happening, it's sore from activity, or we're just not in the mood to
screw - I say take the blowjob boys, and call it an early night.

8. I'm on my period. "Can't we just cuddle instead?" Rarely does
this mean, "Let's go fuck." Period sex does indeed feel good at times,
and if that's what we're looking for, we'll let you know. Otherwise,
please just rub us, pat our tummies and stop blaming "that time of
the month" for our erratic behavior. It's annoying.

9. Can we cuddle? We're feeling vulnerable and need reassurance,
or we just miss being held by another person. Either way, sex is the
farthest thing on our minds. What we're craving is the human
bonding experience. That, or we're on our period.

Can we just cuddle?

10. I love you. "At this moment you make me very happy."
Contrary to popular belief, it doesn't always mean we're "in love" with
you. We say it when we feel safe and satisfied, usually after orgasm
or receiving gifts. Tears may follow.

 11. Tears. Tears are our way of releasing emotion, bad and good.
Yes, annoyingly we cry when we're happy, too. You guys never know
the difference so here's the barometer; if she's crying and refuses to
talk about it, they're bad tears. If she's crying and wants to spill her
guts, they're good tears.

12. You're the brother I never had. "I just want to be friends." She
might already have a boyfriend. In that case, be happy this woman
wants you in her life at all. She could easier admit to being a lesbian,
leaving you no options.

13. I'm a lesbian. 50/50 chance that she really is one. It's a tough
call. (See No. 12.)

14. I think we should get a pet. "Let's have babies soon!" You've
obviously displayed a natural knack with kids; this is our way of
taking the temperature of the situation. How you react to this
question will determine if you're daddy material down the line.

15. That guy over there was totally hitting on me. "Pay attention
to me and don't take me for granted - because that man over there
will happily take your place." When feeling insecure, we like to
remind you of our worth by pointing out its value to others.

16. I'm sorry. No we're not. We are usually just placating you to
get what we want, or to get out of some situation. Women also say
it right before we drop a bomb. "I'm sorry; I should've told you, I just
got out of a relationship. And did I mention I'm a lesbian?"


Note: Is life a missunderstanding and misinterpretation?
Nothing is really complex! - It's your mind fault


25 Things Women Say That Men Misunderstand



You’ve probably tried learning French, Spanish, or German, but
those are nothing compared to Woman (the language). Most scholars
agree that the only thing more impossible than understanding the
language of women is dividing by 0. You have no hope. Don’t even
try. Whatever. See? You probably thought that all of that means you
should just give up and not try anymore right? Wrong! Any woman
will tell you that in the language of women, it means the complete
opposite. Here are 25 things women say that men misunderstand.

25. Nothing

It is something. It is definitely something and you had better
figure it out real quick.

24.Do I look fat in this?
A better translation would be “Do you think I’m ugly?” and the
answer is categorically “no”.

23. Go ahead
Do not misconstrue this as permission. In fact, it’s more of a dare.
Actually, its always a dare. Don’t do it.

22.No
It means “no”.

21. Yes


In most cases this also means no. There are exceptions but they
are very hard to distinguish.


You’ve probably tried learning French, Spanish, or German, but
those are nothing compared to Woman (the language). Most scholars
agree that the only thing more impossible than understanding the
language of women is dividing by 0. You have no hope. Don’t even
try. Whatever. See? You probably thought that all of that means you
should just give up and not try anymore right? Wrong! Any woman
will tell you that in the language of women, it means the complete
opposite. Here are 25 things women say that men misunderstand.

20. Maybe
Still no.
19It would be nice if...

Everything following the “if” is meant to be interpreted as an
unconditional order.

18. Fine

This means the argument is over and you lost.

17. It's okay

It’s never okay. This only means that she needs some time to
figure out your punishment.

16. Are you listening?


You are not listening. There is no way to recover from this.

You’ve probably tried learning French, Spanish, or German, but
those are nothing compared to Woman (the language). Most scholars
agree that the only thing more impossible than understanding the
language of women is dividing by 0. You have no hope. Don’t even
try. Whatever. See? You probably thought that all of that means you
should just give up and not try anymore right? Wrong! Any woman
will tell you that in the language of women, it means the complete
opposite. Here are 25 things women say that men misunderstand.

15. It's up to you
If you think this means you have freedom to choose then you are
very, very mistaken. A much better translation would be “It’s up to
you…to select the right choice which I know but I am not going to
tell you because you should know.” Making the wrong choice will
usually result in an “It’s okay (see #17).

14. *Loud sigh*
You might not think so, but this is actually a word and it can
roughly be translated as “I can’t believe I have to stand here and put
up with your stupidity”.

135 minutes

This depends on context. If she is getting dressed then it is most
likely somewhere between 30 and 40 minutes. If you are watching TV
then it is closer to 0 minutes. As in “why are you watching TV right
now when you should be doing something productive?”

12. Whatever

This is like “fine” except significantly worse. In fact, many times
it will follow #16 (Are you listening?).

11. Thanks

It means thanks. Say “you’re welcome”.


You’ve probably tried learning French, Spanish, or German, but
those are nothing compared to Woman (the language). Most scholars
agree that the only thing more impossible than understanding the
language of women is dividing by 0. You have no hope. Don’t even
try. Whatever. See? You probably thought that all of that means you
should just give up and not try anymore right? Wrong! Any woman
will tell you that in the language of women, it means the complete
opposite. Here are 25 things women say that men misunderstand.

10. Thanks a lot

It’s a very small distinction but this is actually the opposite of
“thanks”. Under no circumstances should you say “you’re welcome”.
Typically that would land you back at #12 (Whatever).

9. Don't worry about it
This means she has told you to do something (possibly more than
once) and she is now going to do it herself. Any further inquiries on
your part will most likely result in #14 (*loud sigh*).

8. We can go anywhere you want

In most cases this means “You had better choose my favorite
restaurant”.

7. We need to talk
You’re dead.

6. What are you doing?


This is actually not a question. It’s a statement akin to “You’re
doing it wrong.”

You’ve probably tried learning French, Spanish, or German, but
those are nothing compared to Woman (the language). Most scholars
agree that the only thing more impossible than understanding the
language of women is dividing by 0. You have no hope. Don’t even
try. Whatever. See? You probably thought that all of that means you
should just give up and not try anymore right? Wrong! Any woman
will tell you that in the language of women, it means the complete
opposite. Here are 25 things women say that men misunderstand.

5. Do you have to do this now?


Also not a question. It means stop doing what you’re doing and
prepare for further orders.

4. You have to learn to communicate

“Communicate” can also be translated as “agree with me”.

 3. I'm not upset
She’s upset

2. We need...

She wants…
1. I don't want to talk about it

She wants you to go away because she is still building up evidence
against you.





Chapter 10.2 - The Secret (Part 2)

14 Confusing Things Girls Say That Boys Misunderstand

It is extremely difficult to understand what girls say and what she
exactly want! At one point she wants you to do certain things but at
the end, she will end up shouting at you that ”why do you do such
things?” Here’re some very common confusing things that girls say:

1. Oh yess!

2. Poor Boys!


3. Do Not Call Her Fat!!


4. Mystery!!


5. Just Listen and Do Nothing!


6. Friends Problem!


7. Hahaha!!


8. Do not judge them!


9. Never criticize!


10. Your Best friends are not allowed!


11. Do not mess with her!


12. Heights!


13. Ohkk!



14. Whoever you like they hate!




WHAT TO DO WHEN SHE DOESN’T TEXT BACK

How to React When You Dont Get That Text Back

You’ve been texting a girl. You’ve used emojis and memes, and
you’ve thought up a cute nickname for her.
If you’re left thinking “why won’t she text me back?” there may
not be anything you’ve done wrong. There are a few ways to salvage
the situation and even more ways to distract yourself.
When a girl doesn’t text back, it is far from the worst sign
Now that checking our phones is a pathological habit regardless
of whether you are waiting on a text from a girl, the pause in her
responses can lead to anxiety. Hanging on to her every word shows a
negative headspace.
What you need to have in mind is that while texting can feel like
the kindling of something special, it’s a limited way to stoke a
connection. The interaction needs to advance to a face-to-face
encounter as soon as possible.
There are numerous ways to achieve this, even if she hasn’t
responded all day.
Before we look at how to manage the scenario, let’s talk about
the important question:

WHY WON’T SHE TEXT ME?

If she’s not responding, it could be down to a busy lifestyle, or
simply being lax with responses.
However, it takes a few seconds to send an SMS, so it’s more likely
that the prospect of seeing you in real life does not make her feel
excited, interested, or comfortable.
That’s not a personal slight. It just means you need to adjust how
you’re communicating.
It’s time to re-pitch yourself.

• LEAVE A DISTANCE…
• …BUT NOT TOO MUCH DISTANCE
• NEVER ASK WHY SHE DIDN’T TEXT BACK
• CHOOSE A DIFFERENT TOPIC OF CONVERSATION
• TRIGGER POSITIVE EMOTIONS
• TEXT OTHER GIRLS

LEAVE A DISTANCE

If a girl doesn’t text back, the important first step is not to
smother her. She’s not responding to one message, and she won’t
respond to 20,000. It’s not going to make you an interesting
prospect if you overshare.
However, seeming not to care if she doesn’t respond is the same
as rationing eye contact when you’re first talking to a girl in a bar.
When she doesn’t text back, don’t text her again for another 24
hours.
This will create demand by scarcity.

…BUT NOT TOO MUCH DISTANCE

You also want to keep the connection going.
Don’t leave a gap of more than 2 to 3 days before texting again.
Texting is more about momentum and consistency than content,
although what you say is important.
It’s difficult to maintain that momentum if she isn’t replying.
There are ways to restore the conversation, but even if you enjoy
playing hard to get, you do have to jump back into the interaction in
a timely fashion.

NEVER ASK WHY SHE DIDN’T TEXT BACK

Golden rule: As far as she’s concerned, you don’t care why she
didn’t text you back.
If you want to give the impression of true core confidence, you
cannot give the sense that not receiving a text message has dented
your ego in any way.
Even referring to the original thread of conversation (let’s say you
were asking what she was doing that night) is a big no-no – it
suggests you’re still trying to pick up the original conversation.
Don’t even joke about not texting back, as it only comes across as
passive aggression.

CHOOSE A DIFFERENT TOPIC OF CONVERSATION

When you’re texting her again after a day or two, it should be
fresh, positive, and give the appearance of spontaneity.
Remember, you’re only trying to stoke enough positive feeling to
get that in-person meet-up.
Start back up with an off-kilter question – something like “What
would the theme tune to your life?” or “If you were a language, what
would you be?”
All you’re doing is trying to spark the curiosity and excitement
that leads to a great first meet-up.

 TRIGGER POSITIVE EMOTIONS

I’ve been through what not to say. But it’s also worth knowing
what to say to a girl that doesn’t text back.
The only tools you have are what’s on your mobile and your
choice of language. Using these correctly will boost your chances of
reigniting the conversation.

Use of emojis and memes can help. Open questions and positive
language can help. Humour is also your greatest asset.
I’ve put up another piece on how to make a girl smile over text.
Give it a read and pick up some tips.
You’re aren’t trying to strike up a deep connection over SMS. You
are instigating enough good feeling that even if a girl doesn’t text
you back in the first place, you can still invite her out on good terms.

TEXT OTHER GIRLS

Know what to do if a girl doesn’t text you back?
The best way to genuinely not care if she texts you back, to keep
momentum going, and to maximise the chances of an impactful
connection is to get as many phone numbers as you can and text
them all.
Are you going to worry about one girl not responding when you
have another 5 to 10 text conversations on the boil? Of course not.
It’s the same way you keep a girl interested in a bar or club – get
seen talking to as many girls as you possibly can. Who knows, you
may even have her asking why you’re not texting her back.




GREAT SIMPLE CONVERSATION TOPICS FOR YOUR FIRST DATE


A first date is not only a woman’s introduction to your world, but
also your chance to make sure that she’s right for you.
 It helps, therefore, to know the right topics to talk about on the
first date. The idea is to get her talking about her values without the
line of questioning feeling like an interrogation. Remember, creating
a warm, fun environment is central to her getting excited to spend
time with you again.
However much fun you’re having, make sure she possesses the
qualities that you look for in a woman.
Here are a few tips and conversation starters for dating and
making an impact.

FIRST DATE CONVERSATION TOPICS

Over all else, the conversation should be about the two of you.
You can still keep the conversation fluid and wide-ranging, but
choose topics that bring out her values.
An example could be:
“Wow, you’re in great shape. What do you do to maintain it?”
She’ll then let you in on her exercise routine. This question gives
her a compliment, allows her to give details about her life, and also
gives her a chance to get enthusiastic about fitness.
If that’s a quality you look for in a woman, she’s demonstrated it
proudly and you’ve still retained the flirty spark of first date
conversation.
Other topics for a first date you can put to great use are films
and travel. A person’s favourite film can say a lot about who they
are and what they believe it, and experiences of watching a film can
draw out anecdotes and reflections on the past that can enrich the
dialogue.
Travel is a fantastic hook on which to build stories and show your
own worldliness and evaluate hers. Look for not only where she
went, but what she absorbed from the experience and the details she
took away.
You can also use this part of the conversation to build a library of
places she’d love to visit. Prompt her to envision the two of you
there. Just setting up those little projected moments creates
anticipation in her mind, and makes her want to see you again.

 Other deeper things you may want to take note of when you’re
evaluating her as a potential partner:

What’s her longest relationship?

Is she family-oriented or career-oriented??
Is faith important to you? If so, is it also important to her?
Does she challenge you or is she passive?
What was the relationship between her parents like?

The last question, for example, is a pretty good predictor of how
she will handle a relationship. People tend to inherit the way they
build connections from their parents.
The key to thinking about how to make conversation on a first
date is finding out what her joy is and getting her vocal about it.
There’s a few ways you can ask this that will achieve different
results.
What’s your joy in life? It’s simple and direct. If that’s your style,
it’s an upbeat, positive question that will get her thinking and
talking.
When in your life were you most excited? This is more light-
hearted, look to draw an anecdote from her and encourage her to
relive that excitement with you.
When was the last time you allowed yourself to experience
excitement? This is a more sexually suggestive approach,
encouraging her to toy with the idea of sexual activity.
I like to use the last option myself, but everyone’s different and
you should use whichever style of questioning you find most
comfortable. The important thing is to keep the conversation moving
fluidly and to stoke positive emotions in your date’s mind.

CREATE PROJECTIONS

You want her to be actively excited about seeing you again.
What you need to do to achieve this is create projections and
images for her to put together. She will start visualising you as a
sexual being and a real option for a future as long as you plant the
seeds for her to do so.
When I want to find out about a girl’s family, for example, I could
use it to say “I’m great with families, especially mums.” Then, I’d
build a fun hypothetical scenario where I met her family for the first
time.
You’re prompting her to visualise you in her world. It falls to the
man to progress the relationship through its stages, from dating to
meeting the family to getting married and beyond, and it’s easier to
move things forward if she’s already imagined you in that role.
You want to lay the groundwork with topics you can come back to
later, and introduce the idea of activities you can do together.

TEASE AT THE END

Close off a first date by talking about how badly it went.
Keep your tongue firmly in your cheek, and say something like
“It’s such a shame how tonight went. I could’ve been at home with a
pizza. That was the shittest date ever, to be honest.”
I talk a lot in my courses about pattern-breaking, and this is a
classic example. It’s the opposite of how people are expected to act
at the end of a first date, and she’ll have heaps of fun with the
uncertainty of whether you meant it.
It’s only the first date, and you still have to retain a sense of
mystery. Why would a woman want to see you again if you’ve
already dumped all possible information on her during the first date.
Have fun, and make a concerted effort to discover her values and
the important parts of her personality.

Chapter 11 - Anxiety (Higher Levels)

Why You Worry: Obsessing, Overthinking, and Overanalyzing

Explained

By Dr. Stein
If you struggle with worry, you’ve probably asked yourself plenty
of times: “Why can’t I just stop thinking about this?” Well in this
post, I will explain why.
It’s a common scenario: a concern about the future randomly
pops into your head one day. Without warning, this worry comes to
dominate your thoughts. You can’t stop thinking about it even if you
try.
Although you may know that your concern is irrational, that
doesn’t seem to stop you from worrying about it. You might even
seek reassurance from others that what you’re worrying about won’t
come to fruition. While this may work briefly, the worry always
returns.

You’re caught in the worry cycle.

It can be an incredibly frustrating, overwhelming, and even
paralyzing experience. My clients who have this problem will often
tell me that the anxiety seems untriggered and random or that they
are just always anxious about pretty much anything.
While the anxiety you’re feeling may seem untriggered and
random, there IS a clear trigger: uncertainty.

Worry is all about trying to resolve and eliminate uncertainty
about the future.

But as you well know, the harder you try to fight uncertainty, the
deeper into the worry cycle you progress.
Here’s how it works: your brain comes up with a worry question.
Maybe it’s “What if I bomb my upcoming work presentation and lose
my job?” Or “What if I fail my final exam?” You then feel an
overwhelming sense of uncertainty about what is going to happen,
which triggers anxiety.
So you figure “Ok, if I’m uncertain about this, then the logical
thing to do is to analyze it. Then I can predict what might happen
and come up with a solution so I’m ready for it. Then I can feel
resolved about this and I won’t have to worry about it anymore.”

So to resolve the uncertainty, your brain switches to analysis
mode.

This analysis can take many different forms. You might try to
predict possible outcomes in your mind. You could try to reassure
yourself why the thing you’re worried about will not happen. You
could try to think more logically or positively about it to take a
seemingly more rational view. You may spend hours doing online
research. Or you may seek reassurance from friends and family
members that everything will be okay.

Sometimes, these efforts DO work, but only in the short-term.

Sometimes, you will reach an answer that satisfies your brain
temporarily, thus achieving a short-lasting resolution and a slight
reduction in your anxiety level. But then you run into a problem:
your brain says, “Well yeah, but what about this?” Your mind
ALWAYS comes up with another reason to be uncertain.
So why are your efforts to stop this not working?

It all comes down to avoidance.


Anxiety gets maintained in the long-run by avoiding the things
we are anxious about in the short-term (see this previous post for a
more detailed explanation of this very important principle). Anxiety
is a warning signal from our brain: it’s saying, “Stop! This thing is
dangerous, do something!”
The way to decrease anxiety in response to any trigger is to teach
your brain that the trigger is NOT dangerous and does not require
the warning signal. The only way to do this is to directly confront
and expose yourself to that trigger so that your brain learns it is not
dangerous. This is the basis for Exposure Therapy, the most effective
treatment for all types of anxiety.
Once your brain learns that it is not dangerous (which can only
happen through directly experiencing it), it shuts off the warning
signal because it is no longer needed. But when you avoid the trigger
instead of allowing yourself to be exposed to it, you prevent this
process from taking place, and the anxiety is maintained. That’s why
avoidance in the short-term keeps anxiety going in the long-term.
ANYTHING you do when you are anxious to try to relieve the
anxiety in the short-term GUARANTEES the anxiety will stick around
in the long-run.
Let’s go through how this applies to the worry cycle:

With worry and generalized anxiety, the thing you are avoiding is
feeling uncertain, and the way you are attempting to avoid it is by
analyzing and seeking reassurance.

Right now, if you have a worry problem, your brain gives you
anxiety as a warning signal when you encounter uncertainty. You
then attempt to avoid this anxiety in the short-term by analyzing or
seeking reassurance to reduce the uncertainty. Sometimes this is
successful and you do make yourself feel better, so your brain never
learns that uncertainty is NOT dangerous and does not require a
warning signal. Therefore, the analysis and reassurance-seeking
keep the anxiety going.

Even worse, worry questions CAN’T be answered!

It is impossible to know the future, so certainty can never be
achieved. This means that all that effort spent trying to analyze,
predict, and plan is utterly pointless…you’re trying to answer a
question that is literally impossible to answer.
So how do you break out of the worry cycle? That will be the
subject of my next post, but I’ll give you the quick and dirty answer
now:

Simply put, you stop trying to answer the worry question.

You leave it unresolved.
Allow the uncertainty to be there. Don’t research the question
online. Don’t ask your friends and family whether everything will be
okay.
Eventually, you will get used to uncertainty and your anxiety will
dissipate naturally. Over time, you will get used to uncertainty in
general and worry less overall. This answer might sound a bit
confusing and maybe even crazy right now, but stay tuned for my
next blog post, when I will explain the solution in more detail.




How and Why Anxiety Causes Bad Thoughts



Anxiety is more than just a mental health disorder. Anxiety
changes your brain chemistry, and has the ability to affect the way
you think. Anxiety does this in such a natural way that you may not
even realize it's happening, which is why one of the main concerns
about living with anxiety is the idea that it can cause you to have
bad thoughts.
Bad, negative thoughts are a common symptom of anxiety, and
unfortunately these bad thoughts tend to create more anxiety,
making it harder to cure without help. This article explores the causes
of bad thoughts and what you can do to try to stop them.




What Defines a "Bad Thought"?


 It's important to realize that there is more than one type of "Bad
Thought." Different types of anxiety can lead to different types of
negative thinking. But "bad" thoughts are common with all types of
anxiety disorders.


There is some crossover in the way bad thought occur, but in
general the best way to understand these thoughts is to connect
them to the type of disorder. These include:

Obsessive Compulsive DisorderOCD is directly connected to

strange thoughts, which are referred to as "obsessions."
Obsessions are when unusual, negative, violent, or simply
disconcerting thoughts enter your head constantly, with no
apparent cause or trigger. For example, an image of yourself
hurting someone you love, or a worry that you left the lights on
in the kitchen even though you know you didn't.
Generalized Anxiety DisorderGAD is slightly different. These types
of bad thoughts are all simply worries, and are often (although
not always) triggered by the situation. For example, if you're out
late you may worry that you'll get in trouble with your spouse if
you don't rush home, or you'll worry about your talking to your
boss tomorrow about your project.
Panic DisorderThe bad thoughts in panic disorder are usually
around health, or the fear of being unable to escape. Health
fears are often fueled by basic knowledge, such as "I may have a
heart problem" or "I have the symptoms of multiple sclerosis."
Internet research often fuels these thoughts, and most come
from trying to find a non-anxiety explanation for your
symptoms.
Social AnxietyThe bad thoughts in social anxiety are generally
tailored to social faux pas. A person will have a severe fear of
embarrassment, and may even imagine the worst happening to
them in every social situation.

 Again, none of these are set in stone, and there is often a great
deal of crossover. The key thing to take away from this is that
anxiety does cause a great deal of negative and otherwise "bad"
thinking. Only a psychologist can tell you exactly why you're having
these bad thoughts and whether or not they're caused by anxiety, but
millions of people with anxiety have some type of bad thoughts all
the time as a symptom.

Bad Thoughts Create More Bad Thoughts

It's also important to realize that the more you have these
thoughts and the more you try to fight them, the more likely they
are to occur. Many people with negative thinking find that when they
try as hard as they can to fight their thoughts, they seem to have
them more.
This is because the anxious brain does something very frustrating
- it reminds you of these thoughts so that you know what thoughts
you _don't_ want to have. In other words, the more you try to fight
a thought away and the more shame you feel over having the
thought, the more likely it will come back.

How to Stop Having These Thoughts

This makes stopping these thoughts more difficult, but ultimately
something you can decrease if you're willing to commit to it.
Learning to control anxiety is the ideal first step. If you don't
experience as much anxiety, you're unlikely to experience as many
negative or bad thoughts. But there are several other tools you can
try as well:

Write The Thoughts Out

When you have a thought, it is natural to want to try as hard as
you can to forget it. But that's not necessarily what you should be
doing. What you should be doing is making sure that your brain
knows you don't need to remember it, because it's already
permanently on paper.
 It may sound strange, but writing out a thought that's bothering
you is actually a great way to take it off your mind. It won't prevent
the thought completely, but many people find that it helps them stop
focusing on the thought itself. Their brain essentially says "okay, I can
forget about this" because it knows that the thought is on paper.

Stop Shaming or Blaming Yourself

You will also need to do something very important - you will
need to be okay with having the thought.
This can be very hard for people, especially if the thought is
particularly troubling. So many people try to fight it away, or feel
that the thought says something about themselves. But you need to
realize that these thoughts are caused strictly by your anxiety, and
until you cure your anxiety you won't be able to wish the thought
away.
The more you try to fight it, the worse it gets. That's why you
need to get into a mindset that recognizes that these thoughts are a
normal part of anxiety, and are something that say nothing about
you as a person. It can be stressful having a negative thought, but it's
more stressful if you try to fight that thought away when your
anxiety is pulling it back.
So teach yourself to accept the thoughts you can't control, and
know that when your anxiety is better these thoughts will go away.

Thinking These Bad Thoughts on Purpose

Another strategy that you may never have considered is trying to
think of these negative thoughts on purpose. This relates back to the
idea that fighting these thoughts are one of the reasons they affect
you so often.
Generally, when you have a bad thought, your first reaction is
anxiety. That anxiety causes you to not want the thought, which
causes more anxiety, and causes more bad thoughts. It's a cycle that
is often hard to break. It's also a cycle that gives the thought a great
deal of power.
But if you think of the thought like you would any fear or phobia,
then if you get used to the anxiety that you get while having that
thought, the thought shouldn't bother you as much. You can do this
in a similar way that psychologists help with phobias. For example, if
you're afraid of spiders:

Your psychologist may put you in a room with a spider (or a

picture of a spider).
You'll feel a lot of fear. But the spider isn't going anywhere and
you cannot escape.
Time will pass, and soon you'll be used to the spider around.
Eventually, your anxiety over the spider will fade.
In the future, spiders will cause less anxiety.

It's not quite this simple, of course, but this type of strategy does
work. Think of it like anxiety boredom. If you're in the presence of
something that causes you anxiety for too long, eventually you'll be
less anxious because nothing happens. You'll simply become bored of
the situation.
You can do the same thing with your bad thoughts. If you think
about them on purpose and let them cause anxiety, then keep
thinking about them until the thought doesn't bother you anymore,
then eventually the thought itself will cause less anxiety and hold
less power over you. It's generally recommended that you perform
this exercise in the presence of a trained professional, but it's
something you can consider if you think you can handle it.

Healthy Distractions

Finally, distracting yourself from the thought can be difficult, but
it's not impossible. Ideally, whenever you have these bad thoughts
you'll find a way to keep yourself so busy that you can't think about
the thought as much even if you tried.
Consider jogging. Jogging naturally tires the mind and makes it
harder to feel tense when you're stressed. You may not be able to
stop the negative thought completely, but by jogging you should at
least be able to decrease the thought's power.
Positive television (no dramas or horrors), funny podcasts,
skipping stones at the park - there are a lot of different ways to
distract yourself from your anxiety, and these distractions can help
you stop focusing too much on the thoughts that bring you stress.

Curing Bad Thoughts Completely

In the end, the only way that you can confidently stop any and
all bad thoughts is to stop the anxiety that causes these thoughts.
Only by receiving the right treatment can you hope to stop your
anxiety, and ultimately the thoughts that come with it.


How Anxiety Can Make You Cry For No Reason



Feeling emotional can be natural. From happiness to anger to
sadness, emotions are your mind's way of responding to life's events,
and on their own they're actually a healthy outlet. Even anger has its
place, and while many people show inappropriate anger, there are
times when anger is necessary.
All emotions play a role in your wellbeing. But when you start to
feel like you need to cry for what feels like no reason, it may be a
sign that you're suffering from anxiety.


Why Anxiety Can Make You Cry

Anxiety is an overwhelming condition - more than people realize.
There are millions of people living with anxiety disorders that are
able to handle themselves every day. These people often feel like,
while their anxiety is affecting their life, it's still under control.


 This is the reason that you can feel very emotional even if you
believe you are controlling your anxiety. Anxiety is powerful - so
powerful that the stress of it is essentially providing your body with
a non-stop barrage of attacks, and your body responds by
worsening its emotions.

Anxiety Can Cause Mild to Severe Depression

Anxiety, while a separate disorder, can affect your social life, your
work life, and your ability to find joy in activities. It also puts a great
deal of stress on your mind and body.
That's why anxiety can commonly lead to feelings of depression.
In fact, depression is often a comorbid diagnosis with anxiety, and in
many cases the anxiety comes first and contributes to the
development of depression.
Anxiety may not cause permanent depression, but the stress on
your brain and the feeling of constant fear and fatigue can often
lead to temporary feelings of depression, and thus crying.

From Crying to Apathy

In a way, it's almost advantageous that you're able to cry. Crying
is actually a natural stress reliever. When you cry, you're letting out
emotions. Your body designed crying specifically to provide this level
of stress relief.
What some people suffer from is worse. Some people's anxiety is
so strong it leads to flat affect - or the inability to feel emotions.
These people cry less, but they also are unable to experience any
happiness or joy. They generally experience one constant feeling of
negativity each and every day.

Crying During Anxiety Attacks

It's also not uncommon to feel like crying before, during, or after
an anxiety attack. Anxiety attacks are single moments of
overwhelming fear. Many people feel impending doom, as though
they are about to die. As a result, they respond by crying, because
that's a natural response to a feeling of intense dread.
After an anxiety attack is over, others may find themselves stuck
with these intense emotions, often about the helplessness they felt
during the attack. Panic attacks are so intense, that when they're
over a feeling of needing to cry is natural and expected. Not
everyone cries after anxiety attacks, but the intensity makes it
natural to feel like crying.

Let Yourself Cry


Many people wonder how to stop themselves from feeling like
they need to cry. But the reality is that you shouldn't - if you need to
cry, you should cry.
This may go against your instinct, but one of the issues that leads
to more intense anxiety is holding back your emotions. There are two
reasons for this:

Your emotions are your body's natural coping mechanism. While

it's true that some emotions can be "irrationally caused," when
the feeling is there it's because your body needs to do it to feel
better. Crying will almost always help.
Holding back emotions also takes energy. You have to focus your
energy specifically on trying not to cry, which means that you
are forced to dwell on the way you feel for longer, which only
serves to increase stress and anxiety.

When you feel like you need to cry for no apparent reason, then
the crying itself can be considered irrational. But that doesn't mean
you don't still need to cry. If your body is telling you to cry, then
allowing yourself to cry is better for your stress coping.

Preventing the Crying Feeling

Remember - you shouldn't stop yourself from crying. Cry as much
as you need to, so that you can let out the feeling of needing to cry.
 The only way to prevent the crying feeling is with prevention. You
need to control the extent of your anxiety and how you react to it
emotionally. Then you'll be able to reduce the way your mind
responds emotionally.


How to Stop Worrying


Everyone worries. Worrying can even be helpful when it spurs you
to take action and solve a problem. But if you're preoccupied with
"what ifs" and worst-case scenarios, worry becomes a problem.
Unrelenting anxious thoughts and fears can be paralyzing. They can
sap your emotional energy, send your anxiety levels soaring, and
interfere with your daily life. But chronic worrying is a mental habit
that can be broken. You can train your brain to stay calm and look
at life from a more balanced, less fearful perspective.

How much worrying is too much?

Worries, doubts, and anxieties are a normal part of life. It's
natural to worry about an unpaid bill, an upcoming job interview, or
a first date. But "normal" worry becomes excessive when it's
persistent and uncontrollable. You worry every day about many
different things, you can't get anxious thoughts out of your head,
and it interferes with your daily life.
Constant worrying, negative thinking, and always expecting the
worst can take a toll on your emotional and physical health. It can
leave you feeling restless and jumpy, cause insomnia, headaches,
stomach problems, and muscle tension, and make it difficult to
concentrate at work or school. You may take your negative feelings
out on the people closest to you, self-medicate with alcohol or
drugs, or try to distract yourself by zoning out in front of screens.
Chronic worrying can also be a major symptom of Generalized
Anxiety Disorder (GAD), a common anxiety disorder that involves
tension, nervousness, and a general feeling of unease that colors
your whole life.


Why do I worry excessively?

If you suffer from chronic anxiety and worries, chances are you
look at the world in ways that make it seem more threatening than
it really is. For example, you may overestimate the possibility that
things will turn out badly, jump immediately to worst-case
scenarios, or treat every anxious thought as if it were fact. You may
also discredit your own ability to handle life's problems, assuming
you'll fall apart at the first sign of trouble. These irrational,
pessimistic attitudes are known as cognitive distortions.
Examples of cognitive distortions that add to anxiety, worry, and
stress, include:
All-or-nothing thinking, looking at things in black-or-white
categories, with no middle ground. "If everything is not perfect, I'm a
total failure."
Overgeneralization from a single negative experience, expecting it
to hold true forever. "I didn't get hired for the job. I'll never get any
job."
Focusing on the negatives while filtering out the
positives. Noticing the one thing that went wrong, rather than all the
things that went right. "I got the last question on the test wrong. I'm
an idiot."
Coming up with reasons why positive events don't count. "I did
well on the presentation, but that was just dumb luck."
Making negative interpretations without actual evidence. You act
like a mind reader: "I can tell she secretly hates me." Or a fortune
teller: "I just know something terrible is going to happen."
Expecting the worst-case scenario to happen. "The pilot said we're
in for some turbulence. The plane's going to crash!"
Believing that the way you feel reflects reality. "I feel like such a
fool. Everyone must be laughing at me."
Holding yourself to a strict list of what you should and shouldn't
do and beating yourself up if you break any of the rules. "I should
never have tried starting a conversation with her. I'm such a moron."
Labeling yourself based on mistakes and perceived
shortcomings. "I'm a failure; I'm boring; I deserve to be alone."
Assuming responsibility for things that are outside your
control. "It's my fault my son got in an accident. I should have
warned him to drive carefully in the rain."
Why is it so hard to stop worrying?
While cognitive distortions aren't based on reality, they're difficult
to give up because they're often part of a lifelong pattern of thinking
that's become so automatic you're not even completely aware of it.
You may think that worrying will eventually help you to find a
solution to a problem or prevent you from being surprised by
anything that happens in the future. You may think that worrying
protects you in some way or even equate it with being responsible or
caring. In order to stop worry and anxiety for good, though, you
need to give up the belief that your worrying serves a positive
purpose. Once you realize that worrying is the problem, not the
solution, you can turn off anxious thoughts and regain control of
your worried mind.
You can't just tell yourself to stop worrying
Telling yourself to stop worrying doesn't work-at least not for
long. You can distract yourself for a moment, but you can't banish
anxious thoughts for good. In fact, trying to do so often makes them
stronger and more persistent. You can test this out for yourself. Close
your eyes and picture a pink elephant. Once you can see it in your
mind, stop thinking about it. Whatever you do, for the next 60
seconds, don't think about pink elephants!
How did you do? Did thoughts of pink elephants keep popping in
your brain?
"Thought stopping" backfires because it forces you to pay extra
attention to the very thought you want to avoid. You always have to
be watching for it, and this very emphasis makes it seem even more
important. Instead of trying to simply distract yourself, there are
steps you can take to retrain your brain and change how you look at
the world.

How to stop worrying tip 1: Hit the pause button on anxious
thoughts

 If you worry excessively, it can seem like negative thoughts are
running through your head on endless repeat. You may feel like
you're spiraling out of control, going crazy, or about to burn out
under the weight of all this anxiety. But there are steps you can take
right now to hit the pause button on anxious thoughts and give
yourself a time out from relentless worrying.


Get up and get moving.

Exercise is a natural and effective anti-anxiety treatment because
it releases endorphins which relieve tension and stress, boost energy,
and enhance your sense of well-being. Even more importantly, by
really focusing on how your body feels as you move, you can
interrupt the constant flow of worries running through your head.
Pay attention to the sensation of your feet hitting the ground as you
walk, run, or dance, for example, or the rhythm of your breathing,
or the feeling of the sun or wind on your skin.

Take a yoga or tai chi class.


By focusing your mind on your movements and breathing,
practicing yoga or tai chi keeps your attention on the present,
helping to clear your mind and lead to a relaxed state.

Meditate.

Meditation works by switching your focus from worrying about
the future or dwelling on the past to what's happening right now. By
being fully engaged in the present moment, you can interrupt the
endless loop of negative thoughts and worries. And you don't need
to sit cross-legged, light candles or incense, or chant. Simply find a
quiet, comfortable place and choose one of the many free or
inexpensive smartphone apps that can guide you through the
meditation process.

 Practice progressive muscle relaxation.
This can help you break the endless loop of worrying by focusing
your mind on your body instead of your thoughts. By alternately
tensing and then releasing different muscle groups in your body, you
release muscle tension in your body. And as your body relaxes, your
mind will follow.

Try deep breathing.

When you worry, you become anxious and breathe faster, often
leading to further anxiety. But by practicing deep breathing exercises,
you can calm your mind and quieten negative thoughts.
Relaxation techniques can change the brain
While the above relaxation techniques can provide some
immediate respite from worry and anxiety, practicing them regularly
can also change your brain. Research has shown that regular
meditation, for example, can boost activity on the left side of the
prefrontal cortex, the area of the brain responsible for feelings of
serenity and joy. The more you practice, the greater the anxiety relief
you'll experience and the more control you'll start to feel over your
anxious thoughts and worries.

Tip 2: Talk about your worries

It may seem like a simplistic solution, but talking face to face with
trusted friend or family member-someone who will listen to you
without judging, criticizing, or continually being distracted-is one of
the most effective ways to calm your nervous system and diffuse
anxiety. When your worries start spiraling, talking them over can
make them seem far less threatening.
Keeping worries to yourself only causes them to build up until
they seem overwhelming. But saying them out loud can often help
you to make sense of what you're feeling and put things in
perspective. If your fears are unwarranted, verbalizing them can
expose them for what they are-needless worries. And if your fears
are justified, sharing them with someone else can produce solutions
that you may not have thought of alone.

Tip 3: Practice mindfulness

Worrying is usually focused on the future-on what might happen
and what you'll do about it-or on the past-rehashing the things
you've said or done. The centuries-old practice of mindfulness can
help you break free of your worries by bringing your attention back
to the present. This strategy is based on observing your worries and
then letting them go, helping you identify where your thinking is
causing problems and getting in touch with your emotions.
Acknowledge and observe your worries. Don't try to ignore, fight,
or control them like you usually would. Instead, simply observe them
as if from an outsider's perspective, without reacting or judging.
Let your worries go. Notice that when you don't try to control the
anxious thoughts that pop up, they soon pass, like clouds moving
across the sky. It's only when you engage your worries that you get
stuck.
Stay focused on the present. Pay attention to the way your body
feels, the rhythm of your breathing, your ever-changing emotions,
and the thoughts that drift across your mind. If you find yourself
getting stuck on a particular thought, bring your attention back to
the present moment.
Using mindfulness to stay focused on the present is a simple
concept, but it takes practice to reap the benefits. At first, you'll
probably find that your mind keeps wandering back to your worries.
Try not to get frustrated. Each time you draw your focus back to the
present, you're reinforcing a new mental habit that will help you
break free of the negative worry cycle.

Tip 4: Learn to postpone worrying

It’s tough to be productive in your daily activities when anxiety
and worry are dominating your thoughts and distracting you from
work, school, or your home life. This is where the strategy of
postponing worrying can help. Rather than trying to stop or get rid
of an anxious thought, give yourself permission to have it, but put
off dwelling on it until later.
 1. Create a "worry period." Choose a set time and place for
worrying. It should be the same every day (e.g. in the living
room from 5:00 to 5:20 p.m.) and early enough that it won't
make you anxious right before bedtime. During your worry
period, you're allowed to worry about whatever's on your mind.
The rest of the day, however, is a worry-free zone.
2. Write down your worries. If an anxious thought or worry comes
into your head during the day, make a brief note of it and then
continue about your day. Remind yourself that you'll have time
to think about it later, so there's no need to worry about it right
now. Also, writing down your thoughts-on a pad or on your
phone or computer-is much harder work than simply thinking
them, so your worries are more likely to lose their power.
3. Go over your "worry list" during the worry period. If the thoughts
you wrote down are still bothering you, allow yourself to worry
about them, but only for the amount of time you've specified for
your worry period. As you examine your worries in this way,
you'll often find it easier to develop a more balanced
perspective. And if your worries don't seem important any more,
simply cut your worry period short and enjoy the rest of your
day.

Use your worry period to challenge anxious thoughts

Postponing worrying is effective because it breaks the habit of
dwelling on worries when you've got other things to do, yet there's
no struggle to suppress the thought or judge it. You simply save it for
later. And as you develop the ability to postpone your anxious
thoughts, you'll start to realize that you have more control than you
think. You can then use your assigned worry period to challenge your
negative thoughts:

What's the evidence that the thought is true? That it’s not true?
Is there a more positive, realistic way of looking at the situation?
What’s the probability that what I’m scared of will actually
happen? If the probability is low, what are some more likely
outcomes?
Is the thought helpful? How will worrying about it help me and
 how will it hurt me?
What would I say to a friend who had this worry?

Tip 5: Distinguish between solvable and unsolvable worries

Research shows that while you're worrying, you temporarily feel
less anxious. Running over the problem in your head distracts you
from your emotions and makes you feel like you're getting
something accomplished. But worrying and problem solving are two
very different things.
Problem solving involves evaluating a situation, coming up with
concrete steps for dealing with it, and then putting the plan into
action. Worrying, on the other hand, rarely leads to solutions. No
matter how much time you spend dwelling on worst-case scenarios,
you're no more prepared to deal with them should they actually
happen.
Is your worry solvable?
Productive, solvable worries are those you can take action on
right away. For example, if you're worried about your bills, you could
call your creditors to see about flexible payment options.
Unproductive, unsolvable worries are those for which there is no
corresponding action. "What if I get cancer someday?" or "What if my
kid gets into an accident?"
If the worry is solvable, start brainstorming. Make a list of all the
possible solutions you can think of. Try not to get too hung up on
finding the perfect solution. Focus on the things you have the power
to change, rather than the circumstances or realities beyond your
control. After you've evaluated your options, make a plan of action.
Once you have a plan and start doing something about the problem,
you'll feel much less anxious.
If the worry is not solvable, accept the uncertainty. If you're a
chronic worrier, the vast majority of your anxious thoughts probably
fall in this camp. Worrying is often a way we try to predict what the
future has in store-a way to prevent unpleasant surprises and
control the outcome. The problem is, it doesn't work. Thinking about
all the things that could go wrong doesn't make life any more
predictable. Focusing on worst-case scenarios will only keep you
from enjoying the good things you have in the present. To stop
worrying, tackle your need for certainty and immediate answers.










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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) for Obsessive Compulsive
Disorder (OCD)



Cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, is the type of therapy most
commonly used to treat anxiety disorders such as OCD. CBT has 3
main components—exposure therapy, cognitive restructuring and
relaxation training. This article will provide an overview of how CBT is
used to treat OCD and how you can recreate CBT type treatment in
your own home.


Therapy for OCD

CBT for OCD is something that can be effective, and has been
verified in the research. In fact, CBT is a great choice for all anxiety
disorders, provided you are willing to commit to it and spend the
substantial costs.


Exposure Therapy

Exposure therapy is a type of therapy that involves exposing the
client to an anxiety trigger in a relaxed and controlled environment.
In cases of OCD, this may involve exercises such as touching a
doorknob without immediately washing hands (for people with
contamination-based compulsions), or purposefully imagining
oneself as a murderer (for people with purely obsessional OCD).
In a therapeutic setting, emphasis should be placed on the client’s
willingness to participate in such activities. If the client complains
about being “forced” to resist their compulsions or ignore their
obsessions, the therapist should offer a gentle reminder that they
agreed to do it.
A person with OCD will have extreme negative feelings associated
with resisting their compulsions and ignoring obsessions, and may
find it more psychologically comfortable to imagine that they would
not voluntarily choose to do so. Facing the fact that they can choose
to do so without any tangible negative consequences represents a
step towards being able to resist and ignore obsessions and
compulsions without any reservations.
If the client is unwilling or unable to participate, they should be
taught further coping mechanisms before undergoing exposure
therapy to avoid this type of therapy worsening their condition.

DIY Tips:

Relax Learning mental and physical techniques to help you relax

beforehand and stay relaxed during the exercise is important, as
purposefully exposing yourself to an anxiety trigger and
panicking will only serve to reinforce your preexisting anxiety
reactions and make it harder for you to undergo further
exposure therapy. Mental techniques that can help to relax you
before and during exposure therapy will be discussed in the
following two DIY sections.
 Establish WillingnessPrior to exposure, spend some time
contemplating the logic and benefits of resisting your
compulsions and/or overcoming your obsessions, and deciding
that because of these potential benefits you are, in fact, making
the decision to participate in the exercise.
Challenge YourselfThere are any number of challenges you can
pose to yourself in your own home, such as leaving a table
crooked or purposefully not washing your hands for a certain
period of time. Before your set time period ends, use the mental
and physical techniques you know to attain relaxation in the
presence of the phenomenon that usually makes you
uncomfortable.

Cognitive Restructuring

Cognitive restructuring is about identifying the underlying beliefs
and thought patterns that form the basis of your obsessions and/or
compulsions.
For someone who engages in compulsive behavior, such beliefs
may include the thought that germs will kill him or her, or that
something terrible will happen if they fail to follow through with the
compulsion (such as counting, cleaning, or organizing). For someone
with primarily obsessive OCD, underlying beliefs may involve the fear
that they are secretly a dangerous person, such as a murderer or
pedophile.
Once the beliefs and thought patterns are identified, the therapist
works with the client to acknowledge that the beliefs are false, and
to teach them healthier and more positive thinking.

DIY Tips:

Keep a JournalWriting in a journal about your daily experiences

with phenomena that set of obsessive and/or compulsive
behaviors can help you to identify the underlying beliefs and
thought patterns that escalate your anxiety. Once you are aware
 of these beliefs and thought patterns, you can spend some time
thinking about other beliefs that you hold that may be more
useful to contemplate when you encounter such phenomena. A
journal may also be able to help a therapist understand your
thought processes and to treat you more effectively.
Make a List of Positive AffirmationsCreating a list of positive
affirmations, particularly affirmations that are catchy or rhyme,
can give you positive and relaxing ideas with which to interrupt
your usual negative thought spirals, reducing their intensity and
ideally stopping them from interfering with your daily
functioning.

Relaxation Training

Relaxation training is training that teaches you how to cope with
environmental and psychological triggers of OCD in a healthy
manner.
Normally, people with OCD experience intense anxiety when faced
with such triggers, imagining that something bad will happen or even
contemplating fatalistic scenarios that could result as a consequence
of ignoring their compulsions.
Relaxation training gives people with OCD useful tools for dealing
with these situations. Breathing exercises, visualization routines and
creating physical or mental triggers for relaxed, positive feelings can
help to curtail the anxiety associated with the situation and build
positive associations with the stimulus to replace the usual negative
ones.
Reducing OCD the Right Way
OCD is a difficult and inconvenient disorder to have. CBT is proven
to be the most effective treatment for this disorder, and doing CBT
self-help exercises can help you realize that you can have an effect
on your disorder and keep its effects from interfering with your life.
The problem isn't that CBT doesn't work. The problem is that it's
simply not right for everyone. Not everyone wants to go to a
therapist all the time, spend lots of money, and talk to a stranger.


















Chapter 12 - Gostrellegy (Stories)

Depression

by DeYtH Banger

04/10/2018

I feel depressed it's not because time goes fast... if you stare in time it
stops... if you don'twatch it swipes... under your fingers.

==========================

This is fact
==========================

I always get worried becuase of not doing what I want to do... but
then I do what I "should" do... thats the moment whenI don't get
upset... but too much from it...
one moment it creates damage...
...

Life can be simple... but you can't bind it...

bind e +simple
- Sounds as stupid as you see the command... very typicalcommand
for cs 1.6.

==========================
This is fact
==========================

Social media... sounds like a social place... but it's not a social
place... it depends from which corneryou look this whole thing from
 a pov of the deepest and darkest corners what you gonnafind it
won't make you happy.

But within each social site there is something which stays behind it
which says it's possible to get happy...
If you stay enoughIf you make enough friends...

YOu can't also not get boredLife is awesomeLife is cool

...
But they forget to say
...

Too much of it causes anxiety,

You ain't gonna get socialyou gonna get anxious, depressed...

Soon you will desire to kill yourself,

...

iF NOT NOW... THEN TOMORROW... I HAD THE DESIRE...

NEVER VERY NEAR TO KNIFE... BUT I HAD THAT THOUGHTIT'S LIKE THE
MOST WORST DREAM EVER CAN HAVE ONE HUMAN BEING.

In a such place there is always I hook... which makes you get hooked
instantly...

it's not necessary.... it just needs to play something

...

Just sometimes... then little more often and then always.

...

I was out of social media

SKYPE
FACEBOOK
 TWITTER
...

Nothing really changed...

...

Nobody really said anything new in skype... in facebook

saying

100000 times "Hi" or whatever... most people won't reply

...

Other will and few of them will say...

"WHO DA FACK ARE YOU?"

...

Twitter

...

I have 247 followers... and I don't feel deeply fulfill, but social media
promises... if you have social media you gonna get deeply... fulfill.

...

I want to do something... but then deny it... and then cry about it...
like some kinda jerk.

It's not Billy... it's Hilly the other part of Billy....

 ...

And one of the next version of hello.....

is FUCK YOU


Depression (Part 2)

by DeYtH Banger

04/10/2018

Life is the most noises part ever heard by human creature.

...

But depression where it goes in this scale... so far it doesn't look or

sound like a noise... but within ...
deep within there is something which kills productivity...
...

SOcial media present for you for this year and your next and your
privious... and so on and so on it's
a pack of depression... + little anxiety as sugar... anxious juice...
and bottoms up.

It's not some kinda junky proverb... if something is proverb... it

should be the whole life is a senless... self-dustruction of humanity..
It's 2018 and depression is all over the world... making to think
about makes me to feel bad about myself but here is the thing.
It's my reality show... so the next victim of depression is going to be
you...

It's so funny that people can nervs from nothing... get depressed
from too much humanity - so the whole truth is that... internet is
full of truthness... not with lies... and truth kills all type of
confidence... What happens after 18 years of freedom and then
work?
...

It's low self-steem position...

which in other words
...
Can fuck... but more fuckeable
...
So he likes to become a victim
...

The new generation is the victimilogy list...

...
 So the counting continues
...

Death over-writes everything

...

But pissing on myself... creates by itself relaxtion... so I fucking love it

...

I ain't faggot
I ain't gay
...

I just love the joy of freedom... of yellowish... life.

And in the end we end up in the sink...

...

God Bless you all

Words (Depression Part 3)

by DeYtH Banger

04/16/2018

Everything starts from words,...

Setences = WordsShort Stories = WordsLife = WordsVideos = Words

...
Everything is made within words, so
does depression, it starts from a simple thought.
...
 Disease, microbes, flesh eating syndromes... or whatever fucking
goes next.Facts are real depression,films can make you depressed.
...

You need enough info to focus you on and then on and onand it
continues.
...

From "IF" to "THEN"

...

From possibility to "LIABILITY"

...

I am not a liar, I am just honest wih your wowrds can destroy you.


Crying

by DeYtH Banger

04/18/2018

Crying like a bitch...
WaaaaWaaaaa...

...

I am piece of shit
...
Peace for shirtless tests

...
 Waaaa,waaaaa

Should I cry?
Is it irrational the whole thing to cry
...

Emotions are luggage.

...

Waaaaaaaaaaa, Waaaaaaaaaaaaa
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaa, Waaaaaaaaaaaaaa

...

Life will stop you,

Life will kill you,
Life is going to waste you the same way...
How you wasted your life.

Warsaw.. .. and Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

Warsaw

...

Getting upset
Getting low self-eSteem

...

Somebody in the end fucking around, why

 Do we care so much what other think about:

- Us
- Our Opinions
- Our Answers
- Our life
- Our Way of living
- Our Questions

WHYYYYYYYYYYYY!?


Wacky

by DeYtH Banger

04/18/2018


Life is wacky,
...

Always focusing on what others

- Say about us
- Think about us

We seem never to get out of our comfort done?

WHYYYYY?

FUCKING WHY?
 ...

Here is WHY!

It's because of the group which is around us, we seem never to have
the guts to do something which is out of our zone.

...

Life is going to put you in depressive state,

And put that spike right in your ass.
Chapter 12.1 - Anxiety (Higher Levels)

Note: Stop for a second (Not Really a second!)

How to Stop Overthinking Everything and Find Peace of Mind



We all overthink aspects of our lives. Whether it's decisions,
regrets, self-worth, or general worries about the future, we're so
often stuck inside our own heads that it feels like there's no way out.
Here's how to quit overthinking everything and move on.

Why We Overthink

When we talk about overthinking, we're talking about a couple of
different things. On one hand, overthinking is when you get caught in
those loops where you're just thinking about one single event over
and over. You might start over analyzing something that happened,
regretting an action you took, or worrying about the future of
something. On the other hand, you can overthink decisions in a
similar way. Here, you'll often analyze them into the ground to the
point where you can't make a decision anymore.
Either way, overthinking is basically when you can't think about
anything else, and it's affecting your life in a negative way. The end
goal here is the same: get out of that thinking loop and move on.

Take Action Now

If you're overthinking an idea you can actually do something
about, the best thing you can do is take action now. This doesn't
mean you have to suddenly run off to make something, it just means
you start taking a step forward.
For example, let's say you're considering moving to a new city. You
can't move immediately, but if you sit and think about the process,
you're going to go around in circles in your head. So, it's important to
do something. In this case, you can start planning. Make a list of
where you want to go. Start researching housing prices, jobs, and
whatever else. Create a financial plan and goals. Write out a
timeline. It doesn't matter what you do, you just need to make a
move toward the idea you're overthinking. Making those plans and
comparisons may even help you make your decision
Moving is a pretty simplistic example, but the basic process works
for everything you're overthinking related to your own future—from
quitting a job to asking someone out on date—you can draw up a
plan of action to make yourself feel better.

Writing for the Huffington Post, author Bob Miglani sums up this
idea:

One tip that I've learned that did more than detox my mind from
overthinking is to turn my often worrisome thoughts about the
future into effort and work. Taking action, doing something, working
on your craft does wonders for your soul.
Each time I would start getting worried about the future, I would
make a proactive choice to physically get up from the place I was
sitting and walk to the computer to start writing or working on my
book. Sometimes I would go outside to work on planting the
tomatoes in my vegetable garden. If I was at work during the day, I
started writing ideas on how to improve my work or work on
something really interesting. Whatever the work or project we choose
— make sure it is a difficult one because that's when we start to get
flow or momentum. That's the place where so much of our success
happens.

As we've pointed out before, getting started is everything , and
that's a big part when you're overthinking projects. We tend to
overthink because we fear failure, but if we just start working, that
dissipates quickly.


 Direct Your Attention Elsewhere

Sometimes, you can't take action, and the only thing you can do
to get past overthinking an idea is to distract your mind. Find a
hobby, task, or activity that engages your mind. When you're doing
this, you allow yourself to put off overthinking and eventually those
thoughts start to disappear.
Personally, I usually go for exercise during these moments. Like
getting deep into a project, exercise can shut your brain down for
brief periods of time so you can just relax without your stupid
thoughts bothering you. Author Haruki Murakami describes this
feeling as "the void" in his book,

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running:

I just run. I run in a void. Or maybe I should put it another way: I
run in order to acquire a void. But as you might expect, an occasional
thought will slip into this void. People's minds can't be a complete
blank. Human beings' emotions are not strong or consistent enough
to sustain a vacuum. What I means is, the kinds of thoughts and
ideas that invade my emotions as I run remain subordinate to that
void. Lacking content, they are just random thoughts that gather
around that central void.
When I'm criticized unjustly, or when someone I'm sure will
understand me doesn't, I go running for a little longer than usual. By
running longer it's like I can physically exhaust that portion of my
discontent. It also makes me realize again how weak I am, how
limited my abilities are. I become aware, physically, of these low
points... I quietly absorb the things I'm able to, releasing them later,
and in as changed a form as possible...

Of course, exercise isn't the only way to do this. Throwing yourself
into anything can usually produce what Murakami refers to as the
"void." It's that place where your mind is close to blank and you're just
concentrating on what you're doing. For me, exercise has always
been my go-to for this because I can force it with exercise. If I'm
overthinking something, it's hard for me to get invested in anything
else. My mind's too distracted and I'm too paralyzed with the
annoyance of having an idea pop into my line of thought all the time
to dive into anything too productive. So, like Murakami, I run until
my mind's as empty as possible.


For others, meditation is a great way to calm your overthinking
brain , but it can backfire if you're not in a good space.
Likewise, most techniques to deal with anxiety , like listening to
music or practicing personal rituals help distract you from your
thoughts.



Stop Talking About It

When faced with the type of difficult decision that causes most of
us to overthink, it's natural to seek out advice from others. This
usually means we talk through a problem with so many people that
it's impossible not to overthink.
As we've pointed out before , too many cooks in the kitchen leads
to poor decision making. As you talk with more people and get more
data, you get more confused, which leads to more
overthinking. Psychology Today explains what's going on in your
brain:
The human mind hates uncertainty. Uncertainty implies volatility,
randomness, and danger. When we notice information is missing, our
brain raises a metaphorical red flag and says, "Pay attention. This
could be important..." When data is missing, we overestimate its
value. Our mind assumes that since we are expending resources
locating information, it must be useful.
We all want to get details and information from other people, but
at a certain point it stops being helpful. When we limit information,
we can look at it more productively. Psychologist Gerd
Gigerenzer refers to this as the "take the best" strategy:
"Take the best" means that you reason and calculate only as much
as you absolutely have to; then you stop and do something else. So,
for example, if there are 10 pieces of information that you might
weigh in a thorough decision, but one piece of information is clearly
more important than the others, then that one piece of information
is often enough to make a choice. You don't need the rest; other
details just complicate things and waste time.
Even if you're overthinking an event that happened to you, your
relationship with your significant other, or a mistake at work,
limiting how many people you talk with can help make the process
better.

Figure Out Why You're Overthinking

Sometimes, we overthink because we can. We'll get caught in a
loop where we're recreating an event over and over, or attempting to
analyze an idea from every perspective imaginable. After hours of
thinking and days of no sleep, we'll often get nowhere. Psychology
Today suggests that even though our brains are often hard-wired to
overthink, you can move the process along a little. Here's their
definition of the problem:
Whether it's worrying about social interactions, our self-worth,
our future, our families or something else, overanalyzing in these
repetitive ways is exhausting and rarely leads to a productive or
helpful outcome. Rather, we waste time overthinking events,
ourselves, actions, people's intentions or thoughts, or repeatedly
trying to plan for all potential future outcomes, even though most
times none of those scenarios ever play out...
One of our biggest challenges - and why we keep reminding
people that you are not your brain! - is that we often take those
initial brain-based thoughts, urges, emotional sensations, impulses
and desires at face value and assume they must be true...
They suggests a four step plan to moving on:

1. Relabel the ideas you're overthinking ("self-doubt," "anxiety," etc)

2. Reframe your experience and identify your thinking errors
3. Refocus your attention on the part that matters
4. Revalue your brains messages with the new information

After running through these four steps, you'll often realize just
how often your brain has no idea what it's doing. With a little bit of
distance, you can figure out why you're overthinking an idea, close
the loop, and move on.
We're all going to overthink, overanalyze, and waste a lot of our
days inside our own brains sometimes. The trick, really, is about
minimizing those thoughts and making them as productive as
possible so they don't get in the way.

Types of Positive Self Talk During Anxiety Attacks


Anxiety attacks are moments of intense anxiety that are
seemingly impossible to control. Your mind races with negative
thoughts - many of them health related, although not always - and
you can't help but feel as though something terrible is about to
happen. Anxiety attacks can be so draining that they can actually
cause temporary depression.
Once you're having an anxiety attack they can become very hard
to control. But some people find that the best thing they can do is
known as "positive self-talk," which is when you use the power of
your words to overcome your anxiety.



How Self Talk Works


Positive self-talk is beneficial because for reasons that are not
quite clear scientifically, your mind tends to adapt to the words you
say. It sounds almost nonsensical - and it actually takes quite a bit
of practice - but for some reason when you say positive things to
yourself long enough, those things start to become a reality.
Self-talk also has the added benefit of simply being distracting
without negative consequence. One of the best ways to eventually
stop and cure anxiety is simply distraction. The less you're able to
focus on negative, anxiety fueling thoughts, the more they seem to
go away.

Types of Self-Talk

There is actually more than one kind of self-talk, and more than
one way to perform that self-talk. The key is to make sure that
you're always positive (genuinely - not passive aggressive) and that
you're saying things to yourself that represent the way you want to
feel. Types include:

Affirmations

This is perhaps the most common type of anxiety-self talk there
is. Affirmations are positive phrases that represent the control you
want to have over yourself. For example:

"I am not controlled by my anxiety."

"I am better than my anxiety."
"Nothing is wrong with me. I have anxiety, and that's okay."

There are literally thousands of affirmations, because there's no

such thing as a bad affirmation. It simply has to be something that
you're determined to believe and feel, even when anxiety tells you
something else. It needs to be positive, uplifting, and you need to be
proud to say it.
The greatest issue standing in the way of affirmations is
embarrassment. We live in a pretty cynical world, and people don't
like the idea of talking to themselves and saying positive statements
that go against how they feel in an effort to find relief from their
anxiety. Because of that, affirmations rarely work right away,
because as you're saying them at first, you're often letting the voice
in the back of your head tell you that what you're doing is silly.
But if you can commit to them and keep at them, eventually it
will start to feel more normal, and you may find that these
affirmations provide you with some much needed relief.

 Distracting Memories

Some people decide to take it a bit further. Rather than repeat
phrases to themselves, they instead want talk to themselves and
remind themselves about amazing experiences they have or happy
moments they want to remember. This type of focus - where you
think about things other than your anxiety and stress - can be very
powerful for overcoming your anxiety attack issues, and may
overwhelm your mind in a positive way with good feelings so that
the negative feelings don't control you.

Problem Solving

Not all positive self-talk is in the form of happy phrases or even
happy stories. Some are simply a type of problem solving that you
love to do.
For example, if you're someone that loves to solve math problems
(and doesn't everyone love to solve math problems?) then perhaps
you'd like to create math problems in your head and try to solve
them. Or maybe you're someone that likes poetry. Perhaps you can
try to remember poetry and say it to yourself.
Remember, anything that distracts your brain is a positive. It's not
just the positive principles of self-talk that are important, or the way
you feel (though those both play a role) - it's also about simply
making sure you're finding some way to put your mind on something
else.

Using Self Talk Strategies

Talking to yourself always seems unnatural at first. But your
biggest supporter is you, and your brain is designed specifically to
try to adapt to reduce stress and make you happier. So consider
using these self-talk strategies to start making a real difference in
the way you see your anxiety and how you adapt to it. You may find
that it's just what you need to make your anxiety attacks weaker,
and overcome them easier.
You should also take my free anxiety test now. This test was
made to help people just like you learn more about their anxiety and
find successful ways to overcome it.


How To Stop Overthinking And Overcome Anxiety Now


Overthinking is as debilitating as it is common. It can stop you
from enjoying social events, disturb your sleep, undermine your job
performance and even ruin your vacations. Typically, it also comes
with all the physical discomforts of anxiety. This means that
overthinking leaves you not only mentally distressed but also
exhausted. If this picture sounds familiar, you’re probably desperate
to work out how to stop overthinking your life and start living.
However, you may have already tried to change and found it an
insurmountable hurdle.
It’s important to know that learning how to overcome anxiety is
possible. Whether you’re trying to figure out how to stop
overthinking in a relationship, how to stop obsessive thinking about
your health or how to enjoy socializing without panicking, there are
powerful techniques you can learn. Let’s explore how to stop
overthinking, first by defining the problem and then by looking at the
most effective solutions.

What Is Overthinking Disorder?

So, what exactly is overthinking disorder? We all get sucked into
obsessive thoughts sometimes, but when this starts to consume our
lives it turns into a serious, chronic problem. Some people are more
likely than others to suffer this problem. For example, those with a
history of anxiety disorder. After all, scientists know that
overthinking activates the same parts of the brain that are involved
in fear and anxiety.

However, even if you don’t have a history of mental health
difficulties, you might be prone to overthinking if you consider
yourself a “problem-solver”. Your greatest asset, an analytical mind,
can easily become an enemy when you get stuck in a loop of
unproductive thoughts. In addition, high levels of uncertainty can
trigger the overthinking disorder. For example, if something dramatic
has changed in your life or you have experienced a major loss, your
mind may start to spiral in the direction of unproductive
obsessiveness.

Overthinking Symptoms And Signs Of Anxiety

It’s useful to have a definitive list of overthinking disorder
symptoms. This allows you to identify when you are really getting
into dangerous territory for your mental health. Looking at the
following symptoms can help you conduct an overthinking disorder
test.

You can’t sleep.

When you try, you just can’t turn off your mind, and you begin to
feel agitated by worries or doubts.

You self-medicate.

Studies on overthinking disorder suggest you might turn to drugs,

alcohol, food or other external ways of regulating your emotions.
This is because you don’t feel able to calm down using our internal
resources.

You’re always tired.

This may be from insomnia, or just from the constant loop of

your agitated thoughts.

You want to control everything.

You try to plan every aspect of your life, down to the last detail.
This is the only way you feel safe, but it never quite works (because
it’s impossible to control everything).
 You obsess about failure.

You tend to be a perfectionist and often imagine how awful it

would be to fail in any way. This fear of failure often paralyzes you,
preventing you from learning from any mistakes.

You fear the future.

Instead of being excited by all you’ve yet to accomplish and

experience, you are trapped in your own anxiety about what could
go wrong.

You don’t trust your own judgment.

You second-guess yourself on everything from what you’re

wearing to where you’re going, what you’re saying and how you
come across to others. You may rely on others to reassure you that
your judgment is sound.

You get tension headaches.

These feel like a tight band around your temples, and you might
also notice pain or stiffness in your neck. Chronic tension
headaches are a sign that you desperately need a rest.

5 Ways To Stop Overthinking Now

Overcoming obsessive thoughts requires an action plan. If you
want to stop overthinking, you need to find straightforward
techniques that work, and repeat them until they become second
nature. You may also benefit from therapy or medical interventions
if your anxiety is especially debilitating, but you can use practical
exercises in conjunction with these treatments.
Here are five of the best ways to overcome anxiety and put a stop
to your relentless loop of thoughts. As you get used to them, you can
adapt and adjust them to suit you.

1. Be Aware Of Your Thought Process And Anxiety Triggers


Obsessive overthinking is different for everyone, so it’s vital to
know your anxiety unique triggers. It helps to cultivate a deeper level
of awareness of your overthinking, asking questions about why and
when it occurs.
Start paying closer attention to your thought processes, and
notice when you’re thinking in an unproductive way. Note down what
you’re thinking, and the form it takes.
For example, are you replaying a previous conversation on a loop,
analyzing it for your failures? Alternatively, are you picturing future
disaster scenarios in your imagination? In addition, write what you
think instigated the overthinking. Was it something to do with a
social interaction? Uncertainty? Going to a new environment?
Your notes will quickly help you pick out specific triggers for your
anxiety. This gives you ammunition to challenge the underlying
limiting beliefs through reflection or journal work. In time, you will
be able to preempt triggers before they cause a serious episode of
overthinking, intervening with some of the further techniques listed
below. Eventually, the hope is that the triggers will also become less
powerful because you’ll understand their origins and know how to
fight back in your mind.

2. Stop Overthinking With These Organization Tips

 One of the best ways to stop overthinking is to harness new
practical ways of dealing with life’s challenges. In particular:

1. Adopt a wider perspective. When something is bothering you,

ask yourself: will this matter in a year? How about a month?
How about a few weeks? Often, you’ll find it won’t matter even a
month down the line. This can help you relax.
2. Make time-limited decisions. For example, you might give
yourself five minutes to decide about something minor (e.g.
whether you’re going to some housework or whether you’ll go to
the gym today). Meanwhile, you might take at most half an
hour to decide on a bigger issue like whether to give a
presentation or attend a big social event.
3. Take breaks throughout the day. Reduced overall anxiety levels
by taking regular breaks to do calming things (e.g. 10 minutes of
meditation, 30 minutes of reading a fiction book or 20 minutes
of walking in the park).
4. Minimize overwhelming input. It’s also helpful to set time limits
on things like working with emails, reading social media etc. If
one of your triggers is this type of sensory overload, you might
give yourself 15 minutes four times a day for these tasks, but no
more.

3. Use Positive Daily Affirmations For Anxiety


Affirmations are statements that help you overcome negative
thoughts. They are particularly useful if you want to learn how to
stop overthinking at night or want to set yourself up for a great day
first thing in the morning.
Here are some good affirmations for anxiety:

“I have the power to decide what I will think about. My thoughts

do not control me.”
“I release my obsessive thoughts and let them go.”
“I refuse to allow my imagination to show me disastrous
futures.”
“I live in the present moment and appreciate the beauty of
what’s happening now.”
“I am more than my negative thoughts. I can and will be happy.”

You can also design your own positive daily affirmations. There
are no set rules for the form they must take. In addition, try saying
them into the mirror, looking straight into your own eyes. And smile,
if it feels natural.

4. Get Active! Retrain Your Brain To Think Positively

Learning how to stop overthinking, anxiety and restlessness also
have a lot to do with building better connections with your physical
body. Both physical and mental forms of positive stimulation help to
rewrite problematic, negative thought processes. For example:

Exercise can work wonders for the over-thinker. It focuses the

mind on something straightforward, structured and rewarding,
turning pent-up energy into something you can use. It also
floods the body with feel-good endorphins that make you more
positive in general. Find something you genuinely love, whether
it’s a team sport, running in a beautiful place, cycling with
friends or swimming laps after work.
Engage your brain in learning something new. Pick up a new
language, try something creative you’ve never attempted before,
figure out how to play a new problem-solving game (e.g. chess,
Sudoku or Scrabble), or take up some form of crafting.
You can practice meditation for overthinking. Simple, 10-minute
body scanning exercises work well here. Breathe deeply for a few
minutes, then consider the sensations in each part of your body,
working from head to do. Notice tension, and release it.
Alternatively, deep breathing also works well on its own. Breathe
in through the nose for two seconds, and out through the mouth
for four. This pattern is proven to be the most relaxing.

5. Be Patient And Live In The Now

Learning how to stop overthinking and worrying also involves
cultivating ways of better living in the present moment. Firstly, don’t
allow yourself to be held hostage by vague fears about what might
happen to you. Instead, confront the toughest question: What is the
worst that could happen? Often, it won’t be as bad as you think.
In addition, you’ll typically discover you actually have the
resources to deal with the worst-case scenario. Secondly, use
techniques that anchor you in the present moment. When you’re
overthinking, slow down physically. Try to notice every movement of
your muscles and everything around you. Your brain will slow in
response. You can also try narrating the present in your head (e.g.
“Now I am taking a walk. Now I am getting dressed”) to pull yourself
back to the present.



6 Ways To Stop Overthinking Everything



Whether they’re beating themselves up over a mistake they made
yesterday, or they’re fretting about how they’re going to
succeed tomorrow, over-thinkers are plagued by distressing
thoughts. Their inability to get out of their own heads leaves them in
a state of constant anguish.

While everyone over-thinks things once in a while, some people
just can’t ever seem to quiet the constant barrage of thoughts. Their
inner monologue includes two destructive thought patterns —
ruminating and worrying.
Ruminating involves rehashing the past. Thoughts may include
things like:
- I shouldn’t have spoken up in the meeting today. Everyone
looked at me like I was an idiot.

- I could have stuck it out at my old job. I would be happier if I
would have just stayed there.
- My parents always said I wouldn’t amount to anything. And
they were right.
Worrying involves negative–often catastrophic–predictions about
the future. They may think things like:
- I’m going to embarrass myself tomorrow when I give that
presentation. My hands will shake, my face will turn red, and
everyone will see that I’m incompetent.

- I’ll never get promoted. It doesn’t matter what I do. It’s not
going to happen.
- My spouse is going to find someone better than I am. I’m going
to end up divorced and alone.
 Over-thinkers don’t just use words to contemplate their lives.
Sometimes, they conjure up images too. They may envision their car
going off the road or they might replay a distressing event in their
minds like a movie. Either way, their tendency to overthink
everything holds them back from doing something productive.

The Dangers Of Overthinking

Thinking too much about things isn’t just a nuisance. It can take a
serious toll on your well-being.
Research says dwelling on your shortcomings, mistakes, and
problems increases your risk of mental health problems. And as your
mental health declines, your tendency to ruminate increases, which
can lead to a vicious cycle that is hard to break.

Studies also show that overthinking leads to serious emotional
distress. To escape that distress, many over-thinkers resort to
unhealthy coping strategies, such as alcohol or food.
If you’re an over-thinker you likely already know you can’t sleep
when your mind won’t shut off. Studies confirm this, finding that
rumination and worry lead to fewer hours of sleep and poorer sleep
quality.

How To Stop Overthinking

Putting an end to rehashing, second-guessing, and catastrophic
predictions is easier said than done. But with consistent practice, you
can limit your negative thinking patterns. Here are six ways to stop
overthinking everything:

1. Notice When You’re Thinking Too Much

Awareness is the first step in putting an end to overthinking. Start
paying attention to the way you think. When you notice you’re re-
playing events in your mind over and over, or worrying about things
you can’t control, acknowledge that your thoughts aren’t productive.

 2. Challenge Your Thoughts

It’s easy to get carried away with negative thoughts. So before
you conclude that calling in sick is going to get you fired, or that
forgetting one deadline is going to cause you to become homeless,
acknowledge that your thoughts may be exaggeratedly negative.
Learn to recognize and replace thinking errors, before they work you
up into a complete frenzy.

3. Keep The Focus On Active Problem-Solving

Dwelling on your problems isn’t helpful–but looking for solutions
is. Ask yourself what steps you can take to learn from a mistake or
to avoid a future problem. Instead of asking why did this
happen? Ask yourself what can I do about it?
4. Schedule Time For Reflection

Stewing on your problems for long periods of time isn’t
productive, but brief reflection can be helpful. Thinking about how
you could do things differently or recognizing potential pitfalls to
your plan, for example, can help you do better in the future.
Incorporate 20 minutes of “thinking time” into your daily
schedule. During that time, let yourself worry, ruminate, or mull over
whatever you want. Then, when your time is up, move onto
something more productive. When you notice yourself overthinking
things outside of your scheduled time, remind yourself that you’ll
think about that later.

5. Practice Mindfulness

It’s impossible to rehash yesterday or worry
about tomorrow when you’re living in the present. Commit to
becoming more aware of the here and now. Just like any other skill,
mindfulness takes practice, but over time, it can decrease
overthinking.

6. Change The Channel

Telling yourself to stop thinking about something can backfire.
The more you try to avoid the thought from entering your brain, the
more likely it is to keep popping up.
Busying yourself with an activity is the best way to change the
channel. Exercise, engage in conversation on a completely different
subject, or get working on a project that will distract your mind from
the barrage of negative thoughts.


How to Stop Being Nervous All the Time



Nervousness occurs in a variety of life situations: before or during
some critical events, at the moment of tedious waiting, when
communicating with people.
In this post I will tell you how to stop being nervous, what are the
methods of controlling nervousness.
Nervousness can be caused by both physiological and
psychological causes.

Causes of Nervousness and Anxiety

Physiological causes occur when nervousness is caused by our
physical health state. For example, our fatigue level can affect our
nervousness level. Nervousness may arise from hunger, lack of
vitamins, lack of sleep.
Psychological causes of nervousness are connected with the
psychological state. Lack of self-confidence, pessimism, shyness,
feelings of uncertainty, fear of failure – all these can become causes
of nervousness.
Very often these two types of causes appear along with one
another which is why, an integrated approach aimed at work with
both causes is needed in order to stop being nervous.
 It is important to understand that nervousness is caused by
internal factors more than by external conditions.
Nervousness is our response to what’s happening around us. And
the way we respond to depends mainly on us.
That is why different people respond differently to the same
situations. Someone gets nervous when talking to a few people, but
someone remains calm when he has to deliver a presentation in front
of a huge crowd.
Of course, there are situations that will make both of them be
nervous. We cannot always influence the run of these events, but we
can improve what we have inside to change the response to the
events of the external world: stop being nervous and worry over
nothing.
You cannot always avoid stressful situations. For this, you will
have not to go to work, not to drive a car and not to leave the house
at all. Stress accompanies every human life, and there’s no escaping.
Therefore we will refine ourselves.
Some people may think that being nervous and worrying in front
of people during important meetings – it’s natural, “normal.” People
who used to get nervous and take it as a norm think this way. But it
is not so: anxiety is not a norm. By refining yourself you can get rid
of nervousness and feel yourself much calmer in stressful situations.
It’s the first thing you have to understand, before we go further.

There is no Point in Being Nervous

The second thing you have to understand is that there is no point
to be troubled and nervous.
Despite the fact that nervousness or anxiety, like fear, can
manifest themselves as protective mechanisms that make us respond
to potentially dangerous situations – most often these states get an
absurd form.
For example, this happens in those cases when we are nervous in
front of people or worried before the interview. After all, these
situations are not dangerous; therefore there is no need to worry!
Any man is more self-collected, organized and his mind works
better in those moments when he is quiet and keeps himself well in
hand.
When we are nervous, we find it hard to concentrate and think.
We splutter and our body begins showing unnecessary physical
activity. If we go on a job interview or some meeting, it can greatly
interfere.
We may forget something important. Because of unexpected
questions we will have our brain freeze. Besides the appearance of a
nervous person: inconsistent tone, moving pupils, sharp gestures –
all these can adversely affect the impression, which the man makes
on the others.
A constant and chronic nervousness badly influences your health
and manifests the cause of many diseases.
Anxiety gives us nothing; it only hinders our development.
Therefore, we should get rid of it and we can do it.

My own Experience

Previously, I was a very nervous person myself and I was
constantly worried at the slightest pretext. My palms were heavily
sweating during the stress, I could not relax, I always got lost in my
thoughts and I faltered.
My habit of being nervous brought me a lot of problems in
communication, in study, in work and in decision-making.
Some time passed and I began to keep myself well in hand,
because I refined myself. I stopped worrying during interviews. I can
calmly conduct a presentation in front of several people. I do not
have my brain freeze because of unexpected questions.
Of course, I am not a Buddhist monk and not a self-control
champion, but I became quieter, and because of that, a lot of things
in my life have changed for the better. The most important thing is
that I have gained more control over myself and over a situation.
I’ve got the feeling like I managed something and I was not a
stooge for my own feelings and external circumstances. This new
feeling was very pleasant and I recommend everyone to experience
it.
And if I still believe that being nervous is “normal”, that’s the way
I am and I cannot do anything about it – I would have never
achieved any results at all.

Practiсe – Tips and Advice

The practical part of the article will consist of several parts:

Preparation – What you need to do to prepare your body for a

possible stress and be less nervous, for example, during an
important meeting.
Self-control on a real time basis – How to control yourself in a
stressful situation
Dealing with the consequences – How to calm down after the
stress
Prophylactic Treatment – How to teach your body not to
respond to stress

Training

If you are nervous before some important event or activity, then it
is time to be prepared not to allow anxiety negatively affecting the
course of events. The more self-collected and concentrated you are,
the greater will your chances of success be.
This applies to job interviews, important meetings, negotiations,
dates, sporting events, etc. What shall you do if you are unable to
pull yourself together in front of one of such events?

Do not Dramatize

If you’re worried about something, very often this “something”
appears to be a trifle, a harmless thing. Will you not take the job? So
what? You will find another. Will you look ridiculous in front of
people? So what? What do you care what other people will think of
you?
Consider every vital issue in some context of your whole life and
of extended period of time, instead of the perspective of immediate
necessity. For example, you worry about that the girl you like will
refuse to meet you.
So what? In a few months you will surely forget her and you will
meet another girl. If you fall in love with someone, it does not mean
that he/she is the person of your whole life.
Try to think about the situations that make you feel anxiety. Try
to think over coolly and calmly. Many problems seem to be serious
and significant, at first glance, but if you think about them better,
their significance disappears at once.
Unexpected baying of dogs can scare you, but if you pull yourself
together and assess the situation, it may appear that the dog is on
the other side of the iron fence, attached to a chain and it barks not
at you at all.
As well as human problems: suddenness can be confusing, but
once you look closer, everything is getting better than it seemed to
be from the very beginning.
If you are unable to reflect on the object of your worries quietly
(most likely it will be so), and you are still worried and still keep the
same thoughts under your hat – then do not think about the
upcoming situation at all.
Keep your mind off this. It’s not all that simple: annoying
thoughts will attack you again and again.
Try not to become obsessed with them, switch to something else
every time they occur. The exercises given by me below will help you
cope with these difficulties.
And remember, there is no sense to be nervous.
But telling yourself to calm down is not always enough, because
your organism still responds to stress, as it is used to respond, no
matter what you may think and no matter how you are winding
yourself up. So you need to work with your body.

Relax your Whole Body

Relaxed body = a quiet mind. Yoga and many relaxation
techniques are based on this principle. This truth has long been
known by people who are able to control themselves.
Try to direct your attention to the muscles and relax the tension
in them. If you get it, you will feel calmer and more relaxed.

Eliminate Nervous Gestures

Stop going back and forth in nervous anticipation. Stop biting
your nails, running fingers through your hair, running out to smoke
every 10 minutes – in a word, stop doing things your body does
when you are nervous.
Sit down quietly and motionless, relax. Watch yourself.

Breathe with your Stomach

When people are nervous, they breathe with their chest. Thus,
breath is increased and intermittent. In order to calm down, you
should breathe smoothly with your stomach at regular intervals. The
technique is used in traditional medicine, as well as in ancient
practices like yoga. The so-called diaphragmatic breathing has long
been proven to be effective.
After a smoked cigarette a smoker feels relaxation, not only
because of the nicotine action. He inhales and exhales slowly, thereby
he stabilizes his breath and he calms down.
Take the advantage of this effect, but without cigarettes.
How to breathe with your diaphragm? Sitting in a quiet and
motionless posture, place your hand on your stomach (this is
necessary for self-control; later, when you will learn the technique,
you will have to do it no more).
You have to breathe in and out at equal time duration. For
example, inhale 5 seconds – exhale 5 seconds. You can hold your
breath between inhalation and exhalation. Inhale – 5 seconds,
holding the breath – 2 seconds, exhale – 5 seconds, holding the
breath – 2 seconds.
Do the exercises with or without delays – as you wish. The hand,
which lies on your stomach, goes up and down in time with your
stomach movement, while chest remains motionless. It is important!
When you will learn to breathe with stomach, there will be no
necessary to keep your hand on it (stomach).
Try to keep the attention on breath and on intervals between
inhalation and exhalation. Do not be distracted by foreign thoughts
and silently count to yourself.
A single session can last from 2 to 5 minutes, and can take longer
depending on your feelings.
This is a very effective exercise that always helps me when I want
to calm down and pull myself together. Try doing it when you are
strained, feel the instant relaxation that the simple practice gives to
you!

Self-control on a Real Time Basis

So, all eyes are on you. During an event, job interview or a
meeting you do not always have the opportunity to sit down, relax
and try to pull yourself together. You need to speak and answer to
the questions in a timely manner. What shall you do in such
situations?
Watch your facial expressions, gestures and intonation
Watch your body. Make sure that your movements are glide,
speech tempo is constant and facial muscles are relaxed. If you
notice that you began to speak quickly or make too many sudden
movements, stop yourself.
Your goal is to make sure that your appearance expresses
complete serenity. The inner tranquility creates the exterior one, and
vice versa. The quieter your posture and facial expression are, the
quieter you are inside. Human emotions are connected with the body
by a positive feedback.
That is why people are advised to smile more often: if a person
tries to portray some emotion on his face, then he begins to feel that
emotion. You can check it by yourself. Smile to someone!
Why you need to watch yourself? Because when you watch your
body and its movements and when you try to control them, you
remain alert for what is going on inside you.
As though, you keep your mind away from emotions by changing
it to the position of an outside observer. This is a good way to keep
some distance between your true ego and feelings of the present
moment. It allows you to keep your concentration and tranquility.
Some emotional storm may rage within you, but your mind will
still be quiet. Perhaps it is difficult to understand by those who have
never experienced it. But this ability comes with practice of self-
control.

Take your Time

Haste never brings to good. It is able to provoke nervousness
and distracted attention. Haste is the need to do something quickly,
but, as a rule, it does not have any positive impact on the speed of
particular task implementation.
When you rush, you start fussing, abruptly switching from one
subject to another. In this state, you can easily forget something, not
to finish some business, leaving it for another task. This will
negatively affect the result quality.
Therefore, do not hurry, even if time is running out and someone
hurry you up (this is done by those people who do not understand
that one should not hurry). Do everything in your natural speed:
quietly, measured and collected.
Carefully prepare for your performances, do not hurry to answer
the questions as soon as possible, your speech should not be very
fast.

Dealing with the Consequences

Everything is over! Relax and do not forget about the subjunctive
“if” (“if I spoke better”, “if it had not slipped my mind”). If you failed
to pull yourself together and you were very worried, in spite of all
your efforts – do not be upset.
Self-control is not an easy task and requires a long and hard
work on yourself. Analyze your mistakes, but do not dwell on them.
Relax and clean up your breath. Diaphragmatic breathing will
help you relieve nervous tension.
Prophylactic Treatment
It is not enough to be able to suppress the nervousness attacks, it
would be better if you become less nervous at all. For this, you shall
carry out regular preventive measures.
 Follow the Sleep Schedule
Permanent lack of sleep badly affect your health and, in
particular, your nervous system. Make sure you sleep at least 8 hours
each day. It is desirable to sleep in one and the same time. The main
principle is regularity and proper duration.
More than 8 hours sleep is not recommended as well.
Compliance with the sleep schedule does wonders! It makes you
more energetic, alert and increases your resistance to stress.

Eat Healthy Food

Eat a balanced and varied food. Your body needs to get a full
range of vitamins. Eat less fried and fast food. Use more food that
contains the necessary substances for your nervous system
(magnesium, vitamin B, zinc, antioxidants): wholegrain food, nuts,
various fruits and vegetables.
Drink more water. Dehydration can provoke a stress.
Be engaged in physical activity
Move more, and spend your time outdoors as much as possible.
Try to rest from the computer when you have such opportunity.
Go in for sports. Sport strengthens the body and relieves tension
and stress very well.
Meditate, Practise Yoga
First, a single session of meditation helps you relax very well.
Second, regular practice increases your resistance to stress.
That is why the imperturbable tranquility became the visiting card
of a skilled yogi or of an experienced adherent of meditation.
In comparison with yoga, the newcomer will need no special place
and an experienced instructor nearby in order to meditate. You can
meditate anywhere. It is very easy to learn the basics of meditation
and even an inexperienced person can do it.
Read more about this in my article how to meditate properly.

Get Rid of Bad Habits

Despite the fact that smoking and alcohol can calm you down for
a short time, the substances contained in cigarettes, alcohol and
other drugs adversely affect your nervous system.
The more and more often you use alcohol and other drugs, the
more your body is subjected to stress in daily life. Drink less
coffee! Caffeine triggers the release of stress hormones in your body.
Try not to Create Stressful Situations by Yourself
When I was at university, I always squandered the study time. At
the examination time I was totally unprepared and knew nothing. I
was hoping that I’m lucky, that I will be able to write off or pass the
examination in any original way.
In such a situation you can be sure of nothing. Because of my lack
of responsibility, every time I risked my expulsion from the university.
Such prospects make you very nervous. Each examination turned into
a big hassle for me, because I was not prepared.
I have been guilty of having created such a stressful situation. I
had the opportunity to get prepared for examinations and to attend
lectures, in order to be sure of a successful test results. If I did it, I
would have saved a lot of my nerve cells.
I have made the following conclusion from this story: do not
create unnecessary stressful situations by yourself! Do everything in
time, so you do not have to do things in a hurry and be nervous.

Get ready for the important meetings and talks in advance, so

that you could have fewer reasons to blush.
Think ahead and always keep in mind a ready action plan.
Follow the plan.

Now, I follow these rules myself. Because of this, the worries and
problems of my life became fewer.


Do Your Thoughts Cause Panic Disorder?



People with panic disorder often experience negative
thoughts with self-defeating beliefs. This is especially the case during
a panic attack when your inner voice may amplify your fears and
anxiety. For example, when panic takes a hold, you may believe that
you really are going to stop breathing or that you are truly going
crazy.
Listed below are some irrational thoughts that are common
among people with anxiety disorders.
In order to change your thinking, you must first become aware of
these thought patterns that are an underlying part of your panic.

Forecasting

When you are forecasting, you are predicting a future event that
has not happened. People with panic disorder typical forecast that
the worst will happen. For example, if you’re afraid of flying, while
on a plane you might think to yourself, “This turbulence feels scary, I
know something is wrong with the plane.” Or if you have
agoraphobia and fear leaving your home, you might think “If I leave,
I just know I will have a panic attack.”
The problem with forecasting is that it only feeds your anxiety,
causing you to feel more afraid. As feelings of panic grow, your
thought pattern only spirals worse out-of-control. Your outlook
may escalate to beliefs such as “I just know this plane is going to
crash” or “If I have a panic attack in public, I will go crazy and have
to be committed.”

Self-Defeat

Anxiety and panic-prone people tend to use words "should",
"ought" or "must" when describing themselves and their situation. You
hold beliefs such as, “I should be calm on planes,” “I ought to
be comfortable in public” or “I must be a failure.” Such harsh self-
judgments are not helpful in reducing your anxiety.
Instead, you become overwhelmed with self-defeating thoughts.
You may begin to blame yourself for having panic disorder, believing
that it is some sort of flaw on your part. You may also use name-
calling, such as telling yourself that you are “pathetic” or “weak.”
This can even lead to overgeneralizations in which you think that you
“will never feel okay in public” or you “will always feel uneasy.” All
of these destructive thoughts add to feelings of helplessness, making
panic disorder even more overwhelming.

Mind-reading

Nervousness is often magnified when we believe that we are being
judged by others. Those with panic disorder often feel that others
disapprove of them, further fueling feelings of guilt and worry. Even
if there is no proof that others are critically evaluating you, you still
believe that others have an aversion to you. You may be a people-
pleaser, wanting to be liked and seen as perfect by others. You may
also feel inferior to others, thinking that you just don’t measure up.
When you mind-read, you have thoughts such as “I can tell by the
flight attendant’s face that there is a serious problem with the plane”
or while out in public you think, “That person can tell that I’m
nervous.
He thinks that I’m neurotic. As you can see, these inner
statements only make your apprehension grow.
These destructive thought processes are contributing to your
experience with panic disorder. Do you recognize your thought
patterns in any of these belief systems? In order to change the way
you think, you must first recognize your typical thoughts. To begin to
change, keep a notebook and pen with you. Throughout the day try
to jot down every harmful thought you notice. At the end of the day,
you may be surprised by how many times you had negative thoughts
similar to the ones listed here.
Now that you have them down on paper, spend some time writing
down a more constructive statement.
For example, let’s say you wrote down a negative thought, such
as “I should be less of a worrier and get a grip.” Try replacing that
thought with a statement like, “Some days are better than others,
but I know I am doing my best to overcome anxiety and panic.” While
out in public you might think, “I know she just looked at me and
thinks I am pitiful.” Replace that with, “She just glanced at me
because I entered the store. I am sure that she was thinking about
her own life.” The more you become aware of your thought process,
the easier it will become to change it. Over time, your views about
yourself and the world around you will transform into a more
optimistic picture.



How To Stop Overanalyzing Everything & Stress Less



If you accuse someone of overanalyzing things, then it is very
likely that they will come back in defense with a response that
negates your statement. Would it be a response that is true to the
reality? Probably not.
The reason for this is that most of us live our daily lives in such a
daze that often times we do not pay heed to things we do on a
subconscious level. Think about it. How many times do you find your
mind drifting about during the course of a day?
Since humans are introspective animals by nature, these
wanderings of our mind often lead us into a state of over-analysis
where we judge and question things that have happened to us, things
that might happen and things that others might have said about us.
What does it get us in the end? Nothing but loads of stress. So
today we will take a look at some ways in which you can cut down
or even completely eliminate this bad habit of constantly
overanalyzing situations.

The Past Doesn’t Deserve Your Attention

Bad things that have happened to you or undesirable situations
that you might have been in the past do not deserve even a second
of your attention, unless the focus is on the lessons you have learned
from them.
Let’s face it. You cannot change your past or the things that have
happened before. Trying to constantly stuff your brain with negative
emotions emanating from days gone by is like trying to draw water
out of a stone. It doesn’t serve any purpose at all and the outcome is
always disappointing.
 Letting go of the past is very important if you want to stop
overanalyzing it. A good way to do that is to talk to someone who
cares about you or a professional counselor and get the bad energy
out of your system. Or you could simply start a journal and write
out all the feelings and frustrations that have plagued your mind for
far too long. Forgive, forget and move on.

Stop Being Anxious About the Future

Just as you did with the past, so must you do with the future.
Being anxious about the future, worrying about what might happen
and constantly dwelling in such over-analysis will cripple you in the
present moment.
Just like the past, you cannot control your future. You can simply
use the current moment to take the right decisions, execute the right
actions and work hard for a better one. But instead, if you constantly
wonder about what might be in store for you in days to come, it will
only prove to be counter productive.
Most importantly, whether you worry about the future or spend
time dwelling in the past, you are missing the present and the
wonderful moments that escape your attention simply because you
were not present.
Often towards the end of the year you hear people saying
something along the lines of “this year went by so fast.” Wrong.
The year went by as it always does, it is you who were not living
in the present. The best time of your life isn’t in the past, neither is it
waiting for you in the future. The best time is right now! As the
famous Buddhist saying goes,
Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate
the mind on the present moment.
Use Self Talk to Keep Yourself in Check
We talk to ourselves all the time. It is often referred to as being
inside your head and it is also what we do when we overanalyze
things. But what if you could change the way you self-talk to
completely eliminate over analysis?
Think about it. If some people are giving you a weird stare there
are two ways in which you can react.
 1- “Those people are looking weirdly at me. Do I look funny? Oh
god! I must get away from this place without seeming awkward.”
2- “Those people are looking weirdly but why do I care? Am I
such a wuss that I can’t stand a bunch of people glancing at me for 5
seconds?”
The latter might seem weird but it works wonders. Poke fun at
yourself and your monkey mind will give up its fight to make you
feel worse. As a result of this, your tendency to overanalyze
situations will disappear.

Meditation is The Best Solution

So earlier we talked about being in the present moment and not
indulging in time travelling forwards or backwards. While it might
make sense to you on a theoretical level, how do you put this into
practice?
Well, meditation is the easiest way to do that. This is the primary
reason why monks indulge in hours of meditation everyday and so
do many of the most successful people in the world.
It is important to remember that meditation is not a religious
practice. It is simply an exercise that aims to bring peace and calm to
your mind.
Simply sitting in once place, closing your eyes and focusing on
your breathing is a meditation in itself. A quick YouTube search on
meditation will lead you to countless guided meditations that you
can listen and follow along.


How to Stop Chronic Over-thinking and Brain-chatter



his is for Cindy – and it’s a great one. Thanks girl!
If you prefer to listen, here’s the podcast version of this blog.
Does your brain start chattering and seemingly never stop? Do
you feel distracted and unable to focus? Like your brain won’t seem
to shut up and it’s getting a bit noisy up there. This is for anyone
who suffers from chronic over-thinking. I will cover the what, the
why, and most importantly, the solution.
The what.
Firstly, I am stoked you are reading this because despite how
simple it sounds, constant over thinking is a big deal. It’s really bad
for you and you’ve got to do something about it because you’re
likely creating gene damage and advancing your brain’s aging.
Overactive brain chatter is also tied to lots of other diseases –
autoimmune disorders, heart problems, not to mention emotional
disorders like depression. How the crap?! I had no idea about the
majority of this research but I am definitely changing my habits as a
result of it. Once it sinks in, makes a lot of sense – here’s my
summary of the science behind it. If you’re interested in reading the
research for yourself, I’ll post all the links to my reading at the end
of this blog.
Fight or flight mode is your body’s reaction to stress. It’s when
it’s preparing to help you escape danger. Extra blood flow is directed
at your muscles. Sugars and fats pumping in blood stream. Your
body takes all the blood from other places like your skin and gut –
so your digestion shuts down. Your immune system pumps out
inflammatory chemicals to give you a short burst in immunity. It’s
designed to save your life. As humans with imagination, when you
are replaying past events, getting angry/upset about events in
future, or generally stressed out every day of the week, this is an
over-activation of your fight or flight response. In the short term
that’s not going to do too much to you, but long-term it has a major
one. It’s called allostatic load and it’s basically wear and tear on
your brain and body.
It accelerates aging and the illnesses associated with aging. The
affects are on your metabolism, your immune system, and also the
aging of your DNA. What does that mean? It affects how we
accelerate chronic illness. It also damages your brain cells.
The relaxation response is the opposite of fight or flight. We calm
down and relax. Things go back to normal. So if you don’t have a
relaxation response, you’re going to stay chemically in stress mode.
If this is you, right now – you need to start a regular manual shut
down practice, today.

The other cause is default mode.

When we’re not present (aka distracted and chocked full of brain
chatter) the brain slips into something called default mode. This is
when the executive functioning of your brain doesn’t work well. You
won’t be able to remember things and you will get worried or
anxious because the part of your brain that tells the other parts
what to do (including emotional regulation) is not working right. In
things like schizophrenia, there’s a lot of default circuit activity. It
means the decision-making areas of your brain as well as the
emotional regulation areas are not working well. The brain gets
clogged up with something called Amaloid, which is a protein that
later leads to Alzheimer’s. So all in all, this distraction and brain
chatter is a big problem and I want you to decide to change your
behavior to remedy it, starting now. Which brings me to. . .

Part 2: The solution.

The solution to brain chatter is all about altering your behavior in
simple ways – just being cognizant and conscious of the solutions
and shifting your habits in any way that occurs to you throughout
your day. I have listed a couple super, super simple tools and I will
ask you to please use at least ONE of them every day – or better yet,
start up your own relaxation practice and make it a part of your
ritual. Just do something – and start doing it today.

Choose to be Caveman

This is quite simply, when you’re bored or maybe you get home
and you’re stressed and want to watch junk tv– Choose to be
Caveman. Meaning, do not turn on a screen or device. Sit with a
book. Draw something. Write a letter. Journal. Or better yet, sit
quietly and “watch” the thoughts that drift through your mind while
you do some deep breathing. This tool is just about deliberately
choosing NOT to turn on a screen when you normally would have. So
employ it in any moment you might be faced with a choice
throughout your day.

Bedtime Floaties

It’s like training yourself to meditate when you’re in bed! How
easy is that?! This is a tool that is only asking for 3 minutes in the
morning, 3 minutes in the evening. Do it in bed while you’re still lying
there first thing in the morning – and again right before you go to
sleep. Close your eyes and breath deeply. Literally, observe yourself
from a distance – like you were another person listening in on your
brain. Allow thoughts to float through your head and watch them –
as though you are outside of this brain. You are just floating through
and listening in on a bunch of noisy voices – they are not yours.

Kick the Phone out of Bed

This is just a simple promise to yourself to get the phone out of
your bedroom and away from your eyes. The blue light from the
screen stops your body’s ability to make melatonin which inhibits
you from reaching a deep sleep. Sleep is hugely important to your
mental balance, not to mention your diet and health overall. Sleep is
when your brain is doing a whole lot of relaxation and repair – it’s
when you’re processing emotional memories (dreams) and
metabolizing your food and repairing your muscles. It is necessary.
Don’t keep it partially “on” right before you snooze. Kick that phone
out of bed!

Don’t Analyze This

That’s a play on the movie – analyze this, get it? When you are
overthinking things, often the suffering comes from getting obsessed
with your own feelings, thoughts, memories and what they mean. As
a rule, do not analyze your feelings – ever. Just observe them and
watch them pass through you. If they are feelings of anxiety, just
watch them. Take note and do not analyze or react. Allow them to
be. Once you start simply observing your feelings and allowing them
to be in your body, you’ll likely be shocked at how quickly they pass.

The 1-Hour Pillow

This is similar to the phone one, but basically, make a rule for
yourself – set an alarm even – that you are not going to pay
attention to anything that involves work or stress or even watching
things that are stressful, one hour before bed. So no reading the
news, no working on your credit card debt, no figuring out the
schedule the next day.

Mini-meditations

Anywhere. I don’t need you to sit down in the dark. Just pick any
and all times that you are not forced to do something else. Let’s say
while you’re in line at the bathroom. Or at the breakfast table. Close
your eyes, sit and quietly breath in and out at an even pace. Focus on
the sound of your breath – or watching the colors you see in the
backs of your eyelids. See how quiet you can get your head to
become.
When you meditate, you grow more grey matter, stimulate new
neuronal growth and quiet your brain stress center significantly. Also,
meditation may be huge in preventing brain decline. It can also flip
the switch on genes that cause disease – so if you have active genes
that are on their way to becoming a disease, meditation can
potentially undo them.

Train Hard to Relax

A lot of us are workaholics and we can just go go go! Even though
it feels kinda cool, it’s really not good for you and it’s especially not
good for your brain. If you don’t have a balanced lifestyle with a
dedicated time for mental stillness, start training yourself to
schedule relaxation. Push yourself into new areas – like try sleeping
in once every other weekend. Leave your phone at home all day. It
won’t feel quite right at first, but know that it’s going to max out
your body if you don’t make this a priority.
Your chemicals can’t handle being taxed for the rest of your life
without a side effect of some sort. Do it for the future-you who
wants to have complete sanity and balance in your old age.
Life is a ratio: not all of it goes to work and thought. There’s part
of you that is meant to lie in the grass and watch clouds shift shape.
There’s part of you that is meant to stare at flowers and listen to
music while doing nothing else. When you get in the habit of
working and thinking and analyzing things non-stop, it becomes
your life. It’s part of culture’s habit and right now, it’s time to untrain
it in favor of having the innate balance you were born with. It doesn’t
take too long to get back there and once you start, you will find you
will be able to quiet your brain more and more quickly. Keeping that
mental stillness and physical state of calm takes maintenance on a
regular basis – so prioritize that time you spend relaxing yourself.
Make sure you put in some time set to “off” on your schedule. If you
commit to doing one thing daily that promotes you relaxing and
being more present and in your body, not your brain, you will see
change. Just start there and know that it’s not lazy – it’s healing.
I hope this helped and I send you my love and vibes of positivity –
I will post a mini-meditation recording soon – so keep your eyes
peeled for that. Smile peeps! Xox Sarah May B.


Don’t Believe Everything You Think or Feel



Sarah* is a 29 year-old public relations specialist who worried
constantly about what people thought of her and frequently
questioned her actions and worth. Whenever she interacted with
someone, and he "paused, even for a second," she says, she would
assume that she must have said something wrong or upset the other
person in some way. In those moments, Sarah would become filled
with anxiety and her brain would run in endless loops, asking
numerous questions, criticizing her, questioning her worth and
envisioning various responses in an attempt to alleviate her
discomfort. She wanted to feel better immediately and wanted to
ensure she'd never feel like this again. If only she could figure out
how to act differently in the future, she thought, she could prevent
this anxiety from coming up again. At times, this repetitive
overanalyzing led her to a short-term solution. Her anxiety would
decrease, thereby reinforcing to her and her brain that all this
overthinking must be working. But, it never lasted long. Soon
enough, another thought or feeling would surface and the cycle of
deceptive brain messages would begin anew.

Many of us have felt like Sarah at some point in our lives.
Whether it's worrying about social interactions, our self-worth, our
future, our families or something else, overanalyzing in these
repetitive ways is exhausting and rarely leads to a productive or
helpful outcome. Rather, we waste time overthinking events,
ourselves, actions, people's intentions or thoughts, or repeatedly
trying to plan for all potential future outcomes, even though most
times none of those scenarios ever play out.
In the past few posts, I have been focusing on habits and how
they become automaticallywired into the brain, below our level of
awareness, if we repetitively focus our attention on them. But habits
aren't the whole story. Thoughts and emotions are as important,
maybe even more so, since they are the stimulus for our behaviors
(and those eventual engrained habits).
Granted, when our thoughts and feelings are accurately aligned
with who we are and how we want to live in the world (i.e. our true
self), all is fine. But what about all those times when they are not?
What about when we experience negative thoughts or feelings (i.e.,
deceptive brain messages) that disparage us, make us question
ourselves or our worth, fill us with doubt or cause us act against our
best interests? Even more to the point, what if we take those false
messages at face value as true assertions about us and who we are?
What if we let them define us and dictate our actions?
Highly insidious, these erroneous messages can cause us to act in
all kinds of self-destructive ways that lead us to feel regret, sadness,
anxiety or despair - and to react, rather than respond constructively
in ways that are beneficial to us. This is why we often tell
people: Don't Believe Everything You Think or Feel!

 "I Think It (or Feel It), So It Must Be True"

One of our biggest challenges - and why we keep reminding
people that you are not your brain! - is that we often take those
initial brain-based thoughts, urges, emotional sensations, impulses
and desires at face value and assume they must be true. For Sarah,
this meant that there were times when she really did think she was
not deserving of love, attention, affection or kindness from other
people (or compassion from herself). This happened because, at
some point in the past, Sarah bought into her deceptive brain
messages and fused them with her sense of self. As this occurred, she
began to believe that if she felt a certain way or a negative thought
entered her head, then it must be a true and accurate representation
of her and who she is.
To help Sarah, we taught her about the Self-Referencing Center, a
specific part of the brain that can cause us to filter incoming
information as having something to do with us. You could just as
easily call this potentially unhelpful part of the brain the "It's All
About Me!" Center. When our thoughts about life and ourselves are
generally positive and aligned with our true goals in life, it's not too
much of a problem for this part of the brain to be active - it leads
to empathy and allows us to understand other people.
However, for Sarah, and many people like her who deal with
frequent deceptive brain messages, funneling interactions, events and
thoughts about ourselves through this center when the negative
thoughts and feelings are running rampant can be quite harmful.
Rather than helping us attune to others, it causes us to berate and
dislike ourselves, often leading to anxiety, depression or unhealthy
habits.
This is especially troublesome when an associated part of the
brain, what we affectionately call the Uh Oh Center begins to sound
the alarm based on how the Self-Referencing Center is filtering
information. The Uh Oh Center is the part of the brain that generates
the physical sensations we associate with anxiety and alerts us that
something bad or dangerous might be happening.
As we explained to Sarah, in addition to warning us to real
dangers, this part of the brain can be activated by perceived
emotional threats as well. The Uh Oh Center responds when we are
anxious, when we ignore our true feelings and needs, and
interestingly, when we experience the distressing aspects
of both physical and social pain. This explains why being rejected or
excluded from social situations feels so terrible - the same part of
the brain is activated in both situations!

In Sarah's case, whenever she perceived that someone was upset
with her, her Self-Referencing Center was filtering the information as
having something to do with a presumed fault of hers (fueled by her
deceptive brain messages) and her Uh Oh Center would fire intensely.
She would then feel incredibly anxious and want to do something to
get rid of that anxiety as soon as possible. Sarah's most engrained
unhelpful response was to habitually (and automatically)
overanalyze what just happened so she could figure out how she
should act in the future - even though there was often evidence right
in front of her that her friend's reaction had nothing to do with her!
Because her Self-Referencing Center was in charge, she could not
take in this other information (including alternate explanations for
her friend's response) or confidently know that she had done nothing
wrong. Rather, she would take the physical and emotional sensations
she experienced at face value and use them as further evidence that
she was a bad person who was fundamentally flawed in some way.

Challenging Thinking Errors

Sarah's inaccurate belief that something was wrong with her was
rooted in a series of experiences she had as a child, where people
inadvertently ignored, minimized or dismissed her needs, interests
and emotions. This inattention to her true needs and feelings caused
many deceptive brain message take hold in Sarah's brain and led to
her developing several thinking errors, including black-and-white
thinking, catastrophizing, emotional reasoning, discounting the
positive, faulty comparisons and false expectations. When we helped
Sarah identify where some of her most upsetting deceptive brain
messages came from and pointed out her thinking errors, things
began to change.
 Sarah was able to start identifying the deceptive brain messages
(Step 1: Relabel) and call them what they were: "self-doubt,"
"spinning," "anxiety" and so on. She then could Reframe (Step 2) her
experiences by identifying her thinking errors or realizing she was
feeling social pain. With this knowledge and a burgeoning belief in
herself as separate from the deceptive brain messages, Sarah could
Refocus (Step 3) her attention on something that mattered to her,
such as being fully present to talk with her friend, going for a walk
or going back to her work. With time, she began to quickly see how
pervasive her deceptive brain messages were and was able to
Revalue them (Step 4) by realizing that this was the feeling of social
pain or self-doubt, but that those inaccurate thoughts and
uncomfortable feelings did not have to be taken seriously or acted
upon with habitual overanalyzing that led nowhere. She was able to
catch herself whenever she got lost in an overanalyzing loop and
stop herself before it spun further out of control.

I will talk more about the research showing why suppressing your
reactions is not the best emotion management strategy and how to
identify thinking errors in another post. The point from Sarah's story
is that we often assume that whatever we think or feel must be true
simply because we thought or felt it. Nothing could be farther from
the truth, as Sarah learned. In many cases, we are actually looking
at life through the lens of deceptive brain messages (fueled by active
Self-Referencing and Uh Oh Centers) and seeing our circumstances,
other people or ourselves from a distorted and inaccurate viewpoint.
It's only when we are able to identify and dismiss the faulty logic of
deceptive brain messages and believe in ourselves that we begin to
break free and change our behaviors so that they align with our true
goals and values in life.



How to Stop Overthinking and Start Living: 10 Helpful Tips



 “Thinking has, many a time, made me sad, darling; but doing
never did in all my life….My precept is, do something, my sister, do
good if you can; but at any rate, do something.” ~Elizabeth Gaskell
Problems. We all face them.
Some are frivolous; some are life changing. Some force us to draw
from within us our greatest mental potential. Many cause nothing
more than stress.
Whatever issues life presents us, whether small or big, we think
about them.
We think about what to do, what not to do, and what would be
“best” for us and for everyone around us.
But how often do we think about our thinking? When do we stop
to question why we over-think, whether it’s productive, and how to
overcome it?
The first time a true bout of over-thinking grappled me was when
I graduated from college.
For many, this time comes as a quarter-life crisis, and the event
often repeats itself later in life. It’s the time to decide what we will
do with our lives, and what careers we will pursue.
We want to make a true difference, help society, and live well.
Although acquiring a comfortable desk job may be easier, it doesn’t
have such a gripping appeal.



And so begins a rare human trait that we would surely benefit
from evolving out of: rumination.
Sleepless nights came more regularly than I ever could have
predicted. Confusion was my norm. Indecisiveness became expected.
Uncertainty was my only certainty.
Fortunately, however, I didn’t drive myself nuts (or so I believe).
Underlying the distress was an organic curiosity, and this led me to
question my approach. What I came to learn truly changed my life.
I managed to collate a number of strategies for effectively
reducing over-thinking. Below are some of my favorite simple and
easy-to-implement insights and strategies:
1. Remember that over-thinking does not lead to insight.
 You want an understanding of which decision will be best. For
this, you need a level of insight into what each decision will lead to.
Thinking this through, however, is futile.



Why? Because you never, ever know what something will be like
until you experience it.
School, college, moving home, getting married, ending a
relationship, changing career paths. However much you imagine
what these change will be like, you will be surprised by what you
discover when you actually engage in these activities.
Knowing this, you can move forward with a true understanding of
what would be best. Acting, therefore, leads to clarity. Thought
doesn't.
2. Know that your decision will never be final.
Over-thinking often comes from the notion that you will make a
grand finale decision that will never change and must be correct.
It won’t happen. And that’s a good thing. If you could predict with
complete accuracy the entirety of your future, would you want to
experience it?
To me, that removes all the spice of life. You must be aware that
however much critical thinking you apply to a decision, you may be
wrong.



Being comfortable with being wrong, and knowing that your
opinions and knowledge of a situation will change with time, brings
a sense of true inner freedom and peace.
3. Learn the reasons why over-thinking is harmful, and let it
motivate you.
Studies have shown rumination to be strongly linked to
depression, anxiety, binge eating, binge drinking, and self-harm.
In one study, 32,827 people from 172 countries showed that life
events were the largest predictors of stress, followed by family
history, income and education, relationship status, and social
inclusion.
However, the study also showed that stress only occurred if the
individual engaged in negative over-thinking about the events, and it
showed that people who did not do this did not become as stressed
or depressed, “even if they'd experienced many negative events in
their lives.”


So, worry about your problems if you wish. But don’t say no one
warned you!
4. Keep active throughout the day, and tire the body out.
Do you want to know one of the main reasons you over-think?
It’s because you have the time to.
Not one day can be fruitful if more time than necessary is allowed
for aimless thinking. A mind rests well at night knowing its day has
been directed toward worthy goals.
So consider daily exercise—any physical activity that raises heart
rate and improves health.
Walking is exercise. Sports, Pilates, and playing with the dog are
too. It doesn't have to be training for the next Olympics. Just get
moving, and get tired.
5. Become the ultimate skeptic.
If you think about what causes thinking to be so stressful and
tiring, it’s often our personal convictions that our thoughts are
actually true.


Let’s look at an example.
If someone you know does something you consider hurtful, but
you don't discuss the issue with the person, negativity can arise with
certain thoughts about why the person acted that way.
But once you can pinpoint which thoughts are causing the upset,
one golden question will release all negativity:
“Can I be 100 percent sure this is true?”
By seeing the inherent lack of truth in your beliefs, you will
naturally find yourself much more relaxed in all situations, and you
won't over-think things that are based on predictions and
assumptions.
6. Seek social support, but don’t vent.


Better than confining your decisions to your own biases,
perspectives, and mental filters, commit to seeking support from
loved ones.
Research has long shown the powerful impact of social support in
the reduction of stress.
But even better than that is getting a fresh, new angle on the
topic.
For me, this has always—on every occasion—led me to learn
something I had never considered before. This is how you grow,
emotionally and spiritually.
7. Develop the skill of forgiveness.
It’s no surprise that having the misfortune of being treated
undesirably leads people to suppress and repress anger toward other
people.
Forgiveness is of the highest of human virtues. Not because it is
morally correct, spiritually mature, or deemed a commendable
personality trait.


It’s special because it, single-handedly, can induce the ultimate
peace in people.
Forgiveness has also been shown on many occasions to help
develop positive self-esteem, improve mood, and dramatically
improve health. It's a predictor of relationship well-being and
marital length, and it has even been shown to increase longevity.
8. Plan for conscious distraction.
When do you ruminate the most? Have you ever thought about
it? For me, I ruminated at night.
When you know the time of day rumination will begin, you can
plan to remove that spare time with an activity that engages your
full faculties.
It could be Sudoku, a board game with family, a meal out, yoga,
or writing letters of gratitude to long-unseen friends.
 A note of warning: there is some research to suggest that doing
this with negatively reinforcing behaviors, such as toxic eating
patterns, can lead to harmful long-term results.

Therefore, be picky about what you distract yourself with, and
make sure it fosters positive emotion and psychological wellbeing.
9. Solve another person's problem first, and get perspective.
“Serve first, seek second” should be the motto for anyone
currently distressed by their perceived problems.
Your issue at hand can become so consuming that others may
look at you like you’re living in your own mental world. And it takes
something to break you out of it.

Helping others puts your issues in order by reminding you that we
all go through tough times, some much more than you ever will.
That’s not to discount the struggles you’re going through, but
helping others will restore balance and harmony in your life.
10. Remember that a perfect decision is never a bold one, so get
started.
When your final years are approaching, you will not worry about
how well you thought through your decisions, or how thoroughly
and accurately you approached life’s forks in the road.
You will rest happily knowing you lived true to yourself, acted
with confidence, and stood up for what you believed in.
So don't worry about the perfection of your decisions. Be swift to
move forward, even if it is in the wrong direction. Boldness is
respectable; carefulness has never changed the world.







Chapter 12.2 - Anxiety (Higher Levels)

Note: Be yourself


When You Fear Making the “Wrong” Decision



“Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth.” ~Pema
Chodron
For the past three weeks, I've been trying to decide whether or not
to move to Korea for a year. Some days I've completely made up my
mind to take the trip. I get excited about teaching myself Korean and
spend hours and hours online learning about the culture.
Other days, I'm an emotional wreck, terrified that I'm making the
wrong decision.
What if I get homesick? What if I'm supposed to be doing
something else? What if I don't like kimchi? What if? What if? What
if?
And then there are those days where my mind resists all attempts
to make any kind of decision at all. I'm immobilized, unable to push
through the debilitating fear.


Being the self-reflective (over-analyzer) type that I am, I decided
to dig deep within myself to find the root of this pesky little emotion
that has been sabotaging my efforts to move forward, or in any
direction, for that matter.
I realized that the issue isn't about being afraid to go to Korea.
The real issue is that I have an overall fear of making the “wrong”
decisions in my life.


Interestingly enough, I also realized that this brand of fear
directly coincides with my decision to live a more purposeful and
spiritually centered life.
(Record stops.)
Huh? I embarked upon this journey hoping to find inner peace,
bliss, rainbows, and unicorns, and I actually seem to be experiencing
more negative emotions than before. Seems counter-intuitive, right?
Not exactly.

What I've been interpreting as an increase in negative emotions
can more accurately be described as a greater sensitivity to myself.
I'm hearing the messages my mind, body, and spirit are trying to tell
me because I've made a conscious decision to listen.


Listening closely to my fears about Korea made me aware of
some pretty negative beliefs I held about myself and doubts I had in
my abilities. The fear I was avoiding actually turned out to be the
one thing that made my decision clear and gave me the courage I
needed to prepare myself to go to Korea.
For those of you who may be struggling with your own fears, I'd
like to share some lessons I've learned along the way:
Make peace with your emotions.


Emotions, even ones we assign negative value to, (like fear),
provide us with valuable information and serve very specific
functions. If you can get over the hostile relationship with emotions,
they can be highly useful.
Emotions can:

let you know what's important to you

prompt you to take some action

guide you toward an aspect of yourself that needs to be exposed

and healed

let you know when you're out of balance so that you can bring it
back to center
 Understand that there are no “wrong” decisions.
It really takes the pressure off if you understand that every
experience you have, whether you characterize it as “good” or “bad,”
is exactly the experience you need to have at that moment. Some
choices may lead to more painful lessons than others, but nothing
hurts like living in fear.


When I was trying to decide whether or not to go on my trip, I
had a friend who flipped a coin and made me commit to the
outcome. Life involves some risk. Flip the coin and see where it leads
you.
Intuition can use fear to help you grow.

Fear is often described as a psychological response to a perceived
threat. Most scientists agree that when it comes to survival, fear has
served an evolutionary purpose. It only makes sense to avoid things
that can potentially harm you.
However, many of us have developed fear from negative
experiences in our past. We have built a protective fence around our
emotional scars, and learned to ward off anybody or anything that
triggers an unconscious fear.
Sometimes our intuition guides us toward those things we fear the
most so that we can push past them and become stronger as a
result. The next time you feel fear, embrace it, examine it, and if
guided to do so, move boldly toward it.



7 Mistakes Anxious People Make In Relationships



Anxiety sucks. Full stop. The end. And many people experience it
to some degree, so you may wonder if you're someone who suffers
from anxiety in a low-grade, day-to-day way or if it's something
more like an anxiety disorder. Because it manifests in so many ways,
it can be difficult to pin down, but wherever you fall on the anxiety
spectrum it is tough. It's tough for you as person and it's tough on
your relationships.
The same worry, circular thinking, panic that affects you is going
to affect your partner, both directly and indirectly. Some of your
anxiety will probably be about the relationship, but in a more
general sense it will inform your behavior, which can also cause
problems. While a lot of this may feel out of your control— a lot of
being anxious is not feeling in control of your thoughts— you can
control, to some level, how cope in the aftermath of the thoughts
and worries that run off with you.
Sometimes this means talking to your partner about anxieties,
sometimes it means trying to ground yourself, and keep some
perspective. You may not be able to control the over-thinking, but
you can remind yourself that you're over-thinking, and try to get
some clarity through that self awareness.


Here are seven mistakes anxious people make in relationships:

1. Second Guessing How Much A Person Likes You


It can be really difficult to accept that someone really likes you,
let alone relax into that feeling and just... enjoy it, trust it. I'm
terrible at this. But no matter how patient your partner is, it's going
get tiring for them to constantly reassure you every second that yes,
they do like you. Try to take some of the responsibility for it, and
remind yourself that they are with you, so they're obviously into you.

2. Not Wanting To Look Too Eager

Along with not being sure that the person likes you, comes with
not wanting to jump in with both feet because, in your anxious
version of things, you're going to end up looking foolish. This can
often lead to being too reserved, and your partner not realizing how
much you care about them because you're worried about ending up
with a pie in your face. It helps if you remember that everyone has
their insecurities, and you shouldn't be making your partner feel
unloved or unsure— exactly the way that you feel— because you're
worried about looking too eager. Talk openly about it and you'll
likely find you're both on the same page.

3. Over. Analyzing.

WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF EVERY LITTLE THING MAKING YOU
FEEL LIKE CRAP. Potentially. Even the things that weren't meant to
make you feel like crap. Even things that were meant to make you
feel great, but then a little part of your brain decides to willfully
misinterpret. "Oh, she thinks I look great today, so normally she
hates how I look. I'm not good enough, she knows it. Sh*t." Take a
step back, take a breath, do some yoga, or take a bath, whatever
makes you feel better.

4. Getting Too Stressed About Timings And Bumps In The Road

This used to be one of my worst habits. It's still one of my bad
habits, but I've managed to get it under control a little bit recently. If
you're really worried that people running late or any timings are off,
it can be a source of major stress. If someone was late I had trouble
not assuming either that they hated me or that they were being
really selfish and not caring about my time. Or both. But neither of
those things were the case. If you're anxious it's easy to take small
slights as very personal, and then that breeds unnecessary
resentment.

5. Not Dealing Well With Changes

I find that routine helps when I'm feeling really anxious. It calms
me and let's me just power through. There's just something
comforting about it. But it's not realistic that you're constantly going
to be able to do the same routine — life just gets in the way. And as
relationships develop, things shift. It's totally natural, but can be
difficult if you're an anxious person. Talking about these anxieties
with your partner is a great way to cope, between getting it off your
chest and giving them a chance to help you handle it, it's a lot better
than staying quiet and letting those anxieties bubble over.

6. Avoiding Talks

If you get all tied up into a knot anyway, the idea of a big deep
and meaningful chat, or worse— a confrontation— can twist you up
into a complete pretzel of nerves. But they're an essential part of any
relationships, and every deep and meaningful chat isn't about
something horrible and antagonistic. Take a deep breath, try to do it
in a setting that makes you feel safe, and have those talks that need
to be had.

7. Jumping To Conclusions

Sometimes anxiety means running through a million ways things
can go wrong in horrible, gnawing, obsessive thoughts. But
sometimes, it means jumping to the worst case scenario right off the
bat, and fixating on that. "Ah I asked him if he wanted to go see my
favorite band and he hasn't replied, he probably hates that band and
now hates me for liking them— it's over." Now the jumpy, compulsive
nature of these thoughts make them really difficult to control. You
may not be able to stop yourself from getting there in the first place,
but try to ground your thoughts and give your partner more credit,
or else they're just going to assume you think they're a jerk. They
deserve better than that.


4 Reasons to Stop Worrying About the Future


I was stressed and burned out always worrying about the future.
With all the chaos at work, I just couldn’t figure out how to deal
with uncertainty of an increasingly complex career path. I had a
family that depended on me and a mortgage.
All the stress and anxiety due to uncertainty affected my life at
home, my relationship and it took years off my health…not to
mention turning into gray the little hair on my head I had left. I was
in a spiral of anxiety over thinking everything, constantly worrying
about the future.
But over the course of the last few years, by randomness and
chance, I learned…I grew and started feeling better because I
understood how to embrace the chaos.
Here are four reasons to stop worrying about the future…actually
these are four WAYS of helping to deal with anxiety and deal with
uncertainty that helped me stop the worrying and move forward…
hope they help you:

1. You can’t predict it.

Stop worrying about the future because you cannot predict the
future.
The main tenet of a lot of our life stress and frustration is this
nagging and seemingly scary feeling deep inside that you just don’t
know what’s going to happen next. From your career to your
relationship to the way your kids will turn out to how ‘things will
play out’ in your business—it is getting harder to figure things out
accurately. Things are so much more unpredictable today because of
the complexity of our society. And it bugs us…it eats us up slowly
from the inside and causes this vicious spiral of worrying and anxiety.
So STOP TRYING TO PREDICT THE FUTURE! Stop wasting your time
thinking about what CAN happen and start spending your time
MAKING SOMETHING HAPPEN TODAY!
We may have made advances in medicine, technology and
comfort, but we still cannot predict the future. Accept it and move
on. Stop trying to predict what’s going to happen next. In your job.
In your career. In your relationship. In your business. Just stop
trying to over think everything and stop trying to predict how things
will turn out. Because you’re likely going to be wrong…and guess
what? You’ll worry even more!

2. You can’t control it.

 Stop worrying about the future because you cannot control the
future.
Luck, randomness and chance contribute so much to the
unpredictable nature of life that it is just unrealistic to think you can
control things. You can’t. I have a hard time controlling my kids and
it would be foolish to think I can control my career or anything else.
Break the root of worry by realizing that you cannot control or
dictate things to just be. It’s just not possible to have total control of
your life when you are so intertwined with so much of the world
(e.g. butterfly effect). Instead, deal with the uncertainty of an
unknown future by focusing your energy on only the things you CAN
control, which are: Your Thoughts and Your ACTIONS!
Freeing yourself from the handcuffs of control to start working
on doing new things to support your goals TODAY is Ju-Jitsu for your
soul! Deal with your anxiety and deal with your stress head on by
taking action of the only controllable element in your life: Your
mind.

3. You’re missing the best time of your life.

Stop worrying about the future because you’re missing the best
time of your life in the here and now.
There is so much you miss in life when your head is in the clouds
worrying about an uncertain future. “My kids grew up in a blink of
an eye”, is what so many people say these days. Imagine, you’re here
on this rock for a short time and you’re missing the best part because
you’re caught up with trying to figure out the future.

Forget the future! Focus on today! Be in the present moment.
Force yourself to focus on what’s really important in your life – your
family, friends, health and the rest. Being in the here and now is the
only truth. When you feel better about all of that, you’ll be more
productive in your career, your business and how you handle your
customers, colleagues and employees. You don’t want regrets in life
looking back and realizing that you missed the best time of your
existence.
During my tough time trying to deal with anxiety and stress a few
years ago, I remember being at the park with the my kids. It was a
beautiful day. No heat. Perfect breeze. Great scenery. But I missed
it. Yes, technically I was there but my head was worrying about
something somewhere in the future. By the time I got home, I
realized that I really didn’t appreciate and take in the fun in the park
with my kids. I was too busy thinking about the future to appreciate
the present.

4. Sometimes the worst is not as bad as you think.

Stop worrying about the future because sometimes the worst is
not as bad as you think.
Our minds play this weird game of attaching strings of thought
with one another. One thought leads to another and then to
somewhere else and then to another place entirely. And the next
thing you know, your neck is in pain and you’re dealing with anxiety
that came out of nowhere. We get anxious and nervous about the
silliest little things…only they seem little AFTERWARDS. Sometimes
we blow things out of proportion and exaggerate the bad that only
our own mind thinks is going to happen. As I went through my own
uncertain up and down journey and observed good friends and
family with their chaos of trying to deal with uncertainty, I realized
that when you look back at the chaos of life that you’ve gone
through – that it wasn’t all that bad. Sometimes, you don’t even
remember it! Rough yes, but the scenarios you thought it was going
to be…probably not! You got through it. You survived. They say,
“things work out in the end” because there is some truth to it.
Worrying about the future will not help you deal with it.
From a very personal experience, I believe that in order to stop
worrying about the future, whether it’s your business, your career or
your life, you’ve got to come to the realization that while we may
have the latest technology available to us on our fingertips, we’re
not anything but human. We can’t predict, we can’t control and
we’re only here for a short time. So forget the future. Get in the
present and enjoy every single moment.
As my mom used to say with such certainty and love, “If you’re
going to worry…then worry about the here and now. Have a
cupcake Bobby…it’ll make you feel better:)”


How to Overcome Getting Nervous Before Workouts



If you spend most of your day dreading your next big workout,
you’re not alone. Most of the runners I coach, and I myself, have a
tendency to fixate on the impending pain and struggle the next
workout will bring.
Fretting over one or two important workouts in a training
segment isn’t a problem – it’s normal and an important part of
preparing yourself mentally for race day.
However, when you begin to dread and fixate on every single
workout, it can become an emotional drain that causes mental
burnout and saps the fun out of running. Moreover, this nervousness
and fear can convince you that a workout can’t be done before
you’ve even tried. You beat yourself before you start.
In this article, we’ll look at two strategies and mental tricks you
can implement to help reduce anxiety before workouts. More
importantly, we’ll provide a mental road map to help keep you
emotionally and mentally fresh throughout your entire training
segment.

Learn to compartmentalize your running

The most effective way to overcome worrying about workouts is
to compartmentalize your running. Think of it like wrapping your
training in a cocoon and separating it from your life outside running.
Compartmentalization is a mental technique taught to me by a
sports psychologist I worked with at the Olympic Training Center. I
was having trouble not thinking about running all the time. I would
spend hours and sometimes a day after a workout analyzing splits
and comparing them to previous sessions. Then, I’d spend the next
few days worrying about the upcoming workout. I’d fret over my
ability to hit the splits, fearing the pain I was going to put myself
through, worrying if what I was eating was going to impact my
workout. Training became a mental burden.
Luckily, the sports psychologist taught me how to
compartmentalize and training quickly became more enjoyable.
I spent an hour before and an hour after each workout thinking
about it. I called it my “training zone” time.
I didn’t allow myself to think about training or upcoming
workouts outside this zone. An hour before the workout provides
enough time to get mentally geared up and focused and an hour
after a run provides time to reflect, recover, and move on.
Like any change, compartmentalization is not an easy or a quick
fix. It will take you a few weeks before you stop unintentionally
thinking and worrying about the next workout. You’ll find you
compartmentalize running easily for a few hours and then have a
slip when you get bored or you start planning your day. However,
this practice will get easier over time until it becomes second nature.
Once I learned to stick within this two-hour window, not only did I
start to enjoy running more, but I became more consistent in
workouts.

Quick tip – Plan so you don’t have to think

One tip my sports psychologist suggested was to create better
routines to take the thinking out of a workout. She had me write
down and design my optimal pre-workout meal, warm-up, and
anything that helped me perform.
Try writing down the elements that help you have an excellent
workout. This will help you plan your day so you can release the
worry of forgetting or over-thinking them. Once these elements are
built into your daily routine, you can stop over thinking the next
workout.

Shift your mindset

Fear, nervousness, and worry arise from not knowing the outcome
of an event. Are you going to be able to hit your target splits? Is the
workout going to feel easy or be one of those sessions you have to
grind through? If you knew the answers to these questions ahead of
time, you’d stop worrying, especially if the outcome was favorable.
To combat this, shift your thinking to those aspects of the
workouts within your control. I tell the athletes I coach to focus on
the purpose and effort of each workout and to concentrate on
achieving that outcome. As such, all they have to worry about is
giving their best effort, which is easy to do regardless of how they
feel. The goal is to remove the fear and nervousness that comes with
needing to hit specific splits and shift their focus to taking a step
forward in their training.
Along the same lines, keep your workouts in perspective. No
single workout is going to make or ruin a training segment. Every
workout is a very small step towards you getting fitter for race day.
Sometimes, it’s even the most difficult or bad workouts that advance
your fitness and mental preparation the most. If you’re putting in the
effort, you’ll still make the gains you need. This simple shift in
mindset can help ease your worry.

Quick tip – Use positive affirmation and self talk

Develop a mantra or mental cues that help you think positive and
bring your focus back to those elements you can control. Whenever
you begin to get nervous or start to over-think an upcoming
workout, repeat this confidence boosting mantra to yourself. This
will keep you confident and help realign your thinking with the true
value of the workout.


Order out of Chaos---Learning to Embrace Uncertainty (Part 1)




The words "order" and "chaos" are particularly value laden. We
tend to embrace order and avoid chaos at all costs. I’ve come to
wonder why that is so. And more to the point, what do we mean by
order or chaos? Let’s start by examining what these terms suggest.
 The notion of order is equivalent to a sense of predictability.
Predictability in this form lets us know what we can expect. It speaks
almost of a range of motion. A pendulum, unaffected by friction, will
follow its predetermined path. We know just how far it will travel to
either point in its arc before beginning its return. Predictability relies
upon certainty and measurable outcomes. It has been a major tenet
of our culture and our science since Newton introduced the motif of
determinism in the 17th century. This range of predictable order is
known as equilibrium.
In our lives, order suggests that we know the parameters of our
experience, as though the boundaries and limits are determined in
advance. The emotional and psychological highs and lows are
familiar. The rules of relationship are understood. Knowing the range
of our experiences provides a sense of order. As such, order creates a
comfort zone as we can be assured of familiar terrain, even if that
familiarity doesn’t serve us.

Chaos, on the other hand, suggests an absence of predictability. It
triggers the unknown, which for most people is very problematic if
not outright daunting. It is a venturing into uncertain territory, far
from the familiar zone. Sometimes life’s transitions or crises present
chaos in the form of illness, death, divorce, job loss, etc. These events
are thrust upon us and we do the best we can to cope with them,
aided by family and professional support. Occasionally, we buffer the
roller coaster ride through chaos with
alcohol, medication and/or therapy.
Sometimes, people seem to slip into personal chaos without any
apparent reason. The struggle that ensues may feel like a crisis, as
the familiar slips away and we try to avoid plunging into an abyss.
But learning to navigate the chaos rather than shutting it down can
provide rich rewards. The inclination to flee from chaos and return to
order tends to stunt our growth, as it precludes vital new learning
and experience. Although personal chaos can be very challenging
and often feels threatening, the flip side is that it provides
tremendous potential for personal evolution. Learning to
accommodate the accompanying disquiet is the desired goal.

 In science, what we refer to as order is known as a state of
equilibrium, with its accompanying predictability. Yet, there are times
when people move far from equilibrium and approach what we
might refer to as chaos. In such a state a single small fluctuation can
throw the person into chaos. In science this is known as a bifurcation
point. This is a fancy term for the point of departure where we head
into new territory. This is more commonly referred to as a tipping
point.
When Rosa Parks was too tired to give up her seat on the bus to a
White man and remained in an area barred to African Americans, a
tipping point ensued and the civil rights movement was catalyzed.
When systems or organisms, including people, reach such a point,
chaos ensues. Yet out of that chaos there is a spiraling up effect,
which leads to a new and higher ordering. We move into a
transformative process whereby we can evolve more thoroughly. In
other words, chaos may lead to a deeper and more evolved state,
which then evokes a new and higher order. It’s simply an engaging of
process in which we let go of control. Think of this as a spiraling up
in complexity, moving up the ladder of intellectual, emotional
and spiritual growth.
One difficulty lays in the fact that we live with a cultural
imperative (Newtonian mechanistic worldview) that values
predictability and shuns if not outright disdains uncertainty, let alone
chaos. Yet, without accepting some degree of chaos, our lives become
programmed in a deterministic way that precludes growth. A
question arose recently in one of my Emergent Thinking ® classes,
which addressed this issue: Does personal transformation have to be
catalyzed by some measure of crisis or struggle?

After a prolonged discussion we came to an understanding that
ordinarily it does. As a therapist, I see my role in such circumstances
as not automatically trying to restore order, but assisting as a guide
through the chaos toward a new and more evolving experience. This
is the new territory that I previously referred to. It’s a terrain of
greater complexity and richness. Small or moderate doses of chaos
can bring us to higher levels of personal evolution. I’m not speaking
of uncontrolled chaos, which is anxietyproducing or worse. I’m
proposing embracing a reasonable degree of uncertainty as the flow
of life presents wonderful opportunities for our enrichment. Chaos is
simply a word. We might do well to ask why we are so reactive to it.
To be continued..



Embrace The Chaos: How To Reduce Stress In 5 Easy Steps




Stress is one of the biggest causes of health problems in many
people’s lives: it can cause heart disease, depression, anxiety attacks,
sleep problems, auto-immune diseases, weight problems and more.
But we’re busy–how do we drop the stress levels down while still
getting our jobs done, taking care of ourselves and our families?
The busy person might have no time for weeklong meditation
retreats, mini-vacations, or weekly counseling sessions. So what can
be done?
I’m going to be brief about this: there are five small things you
can do. A few shifts in mindset, a couple actions that take only a
couple minutes. These won’t solve the most severe stress problems,
but they’ll help most of us.

1. BE COMPLETELY IN ONE TASK.

Instead of being in the stressful task-switching mode, take your
next task, let everything else go, and just be in the moment with this
one task. Let yourself be immersed in this one task, letting go of the
feeling that you need to quickly rush through it, that you need to get
on to the next task. There will always be a next task–the nature of
task lists is that they’re neverending. So let those other tasks come
later. Just be in this one task, like it’s your entire universe.

2. SEE YOUR IDEALS AND LET GO OF CONTROL.

 Fear is causing you to be stressed, not external factors like your
job or family problems. Those external things are just a part of life,
but they become stressful when you fear failure, fear people won’t
like you, fear you’re not good enough, fear abandonment, and so on.
This fear is based on some ideal (and you fear not getting that ideal):
you have an image that you’re going to succeed, be perfect, have
people like you, be comfortable all the time. These ideals are a way
to be in control of the world that you don’t actually control, but
they’re hurting you by causing fear and stress. Instead, let go of
control. Be OK with chaos and uncertainty, and trust that things will
work out. You’ll fear less and be less stressed.

3. ACCEPT PEOPLE AND SMILE.

We get upset at other people because they don’t meet our ideals
of how they should act. Instead, try accepting them for who they
are, and recognizing that, like you, they’re imperfect and seeking
happiness and struggling with finding happiness. They’re doing their
best. Accept them, smile, and enjoy your time with this person.

4. TAKE A BRIEF WALK.

When things are getting stressful, take two to three minutes to
take a walk and clear your mind. A short walk does wonders.

5. DO SHORT MINDFULNESS PRACTICES.

You don’t have to meditate for 30 minutes to get the benefits of
mindfulness. You can do a quick body scan (see how your body is
feeling right now) in 10 seconds. You can pay attention to your
breath for 30 seconds. You can watch your thoughts, fears, ideals for
a minute. You can walk mindfully, paying attention to your body,
your feet, your breath, your surroundings, as you walk. You can do
each of these kinds of mindfulness practices in little bits throughout
your day.
And beyond: If you have extra time after doing those things, I
have a few other recommendations that will help. Eliminate
unnecessary tasks on your to-do list, reduce your commitments by
saying no to people, start a regular 5-minute meditation
practice, eat healthier, exercise regularly, spend some quality time
with loved ones, get more sleep, drink tea.
I should note that many people cope with stress in unhealthy
ways: alcohol, smoking, drugs, unhealthy eating, lashing out at
people, watching TV, procrastinating. Ironically these cause more
stress. Instead, learn to cope without these crutches.










Chapter 13 - Wow Effect

It sucks seeing such a nation like "YOU" and "ME" to be closed in a

...

This is so outcast and fucked up, once there... few days everything
goes find... then weeks... and months comes which turn to years...
once a year you catch... you start feeling in your gut
 some anxiety. Which stops you from doing any type of activity... I
was going to go to

But the weather turn bad.... so I am going to play on my
computer
...

But today I saw the people which I hate aka bullies... better stay
home
But today I am not really in the mood... that's why I gonna stay
home aka lazy aka procrastination
But today isn't my day.... that's why I gonna be home and watch
TV
...


ANd the reasons could continue


....
But this is not the only activity

you can be turning on the music

IN home and one moment... you got one gut feeling which tells
you

"Now my neighbor is going to get angry."
"Now my neighbors are going to call the police.
"Now my neighbor/s is/are going to see me as a strange
kid/teenager/adult."
"Now.... my neighbor is going to laugh at me." - Strangely enough
it sounds spooky!




It could be the porn (P.S. - I study porn and the effects of
pornography... so far my conclusions about this topic are that most
of the pornographic material is forced orgasm... it goes few rounds...
everyone in the videos seems to like it... and enjoy it and now comes
the juicy part... is life all about SEX AND SEX AND SEX AND SEXX AND
SEX And Masturbating and Masturbating and BLOWJOB?)




The problem of porn as the further study above and in the
previous book said is that it causes anxiety it makes you expect
something whole different level of shit... but in really life some of
this shit... get lost behind the lines.

...

I am proud to say that I am free from pornography, If I can be free

so do you...

The first move is from you... read this book and the privious one...

...

Slowly and focus...

TURN OFF TV
TURN OFF PORNOGRAPHY
TURN OFF Games

...

Turn off everything which makes you to stop focusing on this book

...

The problem in porn is:

It starts making you feel that this whole topic about sex is
sensitive
It starts making you exhausted
It causes anxiety
It makes you feel "And now what my neighbor is thinking about
me."
It makes you to get a private life and less social life
It makes you feel that stay home and watching porn is cool shit
It start makes you feel embarrased


Do you want that?


Do you want social barriers

A barrier which always stops you growing and doing stuff which
you want


...


You could see that girl:















- If your thing is male and you are female... the same goes and
here

...

You could see a hight status male... I am talking about the males
which you see in the playboy magazines

...

ANd you could talk to them if you see them on the street... but
what happens?



That's the group... you are in it... but you don't walk with
anybody... people know you in this group some of them are
your friends... but you don 't talk with them... they don't talk with
you.

...

HOw fucked up is that?

...

Why you don't go out and start doing stuff... go and say

"I" and your opinion... stop being and acting like a biatch...
stopping to persuing your goals because somebody said "That" and
somebody "FUCK YOU UP"...

...
This guy over there comes always with excuses...

Don't ask life why doesn't help you anymore and you are so
fucked up
...

Life will kill you slowly and say "EXCUSE ME" ...

the same thing now you are doing "Excuse me... life... but I won't
do that."
Chapter 14 - Social Is Addiction

Being social is an addiction... but people take it as healty thing...

if they do... should I go for it?
...

But here is the thing the moment in your life when you start
spending time more in home and being lazy...

...

It creates procrastination... by that you stop time and you start living
in your head... do you want such life?

...

If "NO"... then let's continue... shall we?

Chapter 14.1 - Insight

"In other words, instead of the instinctive response stopping at a

‘sweet spot’ where it doesn't lure the animal out of the mating game
entirely, this innate programming continues to trigger enthusiastic
responses to unrealistic, synthetic stimuli. Tinbergen dubbed such
deceptions ‘supranormal stimuli,’ although they are now often
referred to simply as 'supernormal stimuli'."

"When we make an artificial supernormal stimulus our top priority

it's because it has triggered a bigger blast of dopamine in our brain's
reward circuit than its natural counterpart. For most users,
yesteryear's porn magazines couldn't compete with real partners. A
Playboy centrefold did not duplicate the other cues earlier porn users
had learned to associate with real potential or actual partners: eye
contact, touch, scent, the thrill of flirting and dancing, foreplay, sex
and so forth."

"Second, internet porn offers countless artificially enhanced breasts

and Viagra-sustained gargantuan penises, exaggerated grunts of
desire, pile-driving thrusts, double or triple penetration, gang-bangs
and other unrealistic scenarios.
Third, for most people, static images cannot compare with today's
hi-def 3-minute videos of people engaged in intense sex. With stills
of naked bunnies all you had was your own imagination. You always
knew what was going to happen next, which wasn't much in the case
of a pre-internet 13-year old. In contrast, with an endless stream of
‘I can't believe what I just saw’ videos, your expectations are
constantly violated (which the brain finds more stimulating).[64]
Keep in mind also, that humans evolved to learn by watching others
doing things, so videos are more powerful ‘how to’ lessons than
stills."

"Cheap, plentiful junk food fits this model and is universally

recognized as a supernormal stimulus. You can slam down a 32-
ounce soft drink and a bag of salty nibbles without much thought,
but just try to consume their caloric equivalent in dried venison and
boiled roots!
Similarly, viewers routinely spend hours surfing galleries of porn
videos searching for the right video to finish, keeping dopamine
elevated for abnormally long periods."



"Finally, there are limits on food consumption: stomach capacity
and the natural aversion that kicks in when we can't face one more
bite of something. In contrast, there are no
physical limits on internet porn consumption, other than the need for
sleep and bathroom breaks. A user can edge (masturbate without
climaxing) to porn for hours without triggering feelings of satiation,
or aversion.
Bingeing on porn feels
like a promise of pleasure, but recall that the message

of dopamine isn't ‘satisfaction’. It's, ‘keep going, satisfaction is j-u-s-t

around the corner’."

"Sexual Conditioning

One possible outcome is unanticipated sexual conditioning – which
didn't happen to your father when he used Playboy. Perhaps you wire
your sexual excitement to a screen, constant novelty, voyeurism or
bizarre acts. Worst case, you eventually need both porn's content and
delivery-at-a-click to sustain arousal
Before I quit I had the utmost trouble getting off. I actually had to
close my eyes and imagine a CONSTANT stream of porn to climax. I
was more or less using my girlfriends' bodies to help me jerk off.
After a long streak without porn, I could climax easily, without
thinking about it. It was a miracle. It was the best feeling ever."


Via Brain on Porn by Garry Wilson
Part 3

You can be free!

...


“I was petrified of making a mistake—head-banging to the wrong
song or not hard enough, or thinking a guitar solo was over when it
wasn't. A rule of thumb is that if the guitar solo is by Led Zep or
Lynyrd Skynyrd then it's not over. Ever.”
― Mark Barrowcliffe, The Elfish Gene: Dungeons, Dragons And
Growing Up Strange


“It's people with obsessions who do the real harm in the world.”
― Dick Francis, 10 lb Penalty







Chapter 1 - Truth

Mental Fallout: Dealing With Depression After Porn Use

Numb All Over

Why is this happening? Things are going good. I’m doing better.
I’m more focused and motivated, school is finally manageable again,
I feel calm around my friends and my family. I know this is
working… but I still just feel empty. I should be ecstatic about all the
changes I’m making, and sometimes I am, but just for a moment. It’s
like I’m numb all over.
Does this sound at all familiar?
We can get caught up in an addiction for many reasons but at
some point it becomes about escaping. We stop trying, working, or
worrying. When negativity and stress come our way we try to sweep
it aside with the wave of pleasure that come from porn use.
Three things come as a result of this constant venting of our
feelings and problems. First, we stop learning how to deal with
anything that puts pressure on us, even if it’s good pressure. Second,
we don’t just numb out the bad but we numb out the good. We are
so used to the huge flood of chemicals in our brains from porn that
anything normal that should make us feel great, just feels like
another small drop in the bucket. Third, because the simple pleasures
in life no longer cut it, our brains and bodies freak out. This is known
as withdrawal. This lovely combination of emotional and mental
fallout from porn addiction is usually manifested in things like
depression and anxiety.

Depression/Anxiety

When it comes to porn addiction, the first thing to remember
about depression and anxiety is that they are symptoms of a bigger
issue. That isn’t to say that these imbalances aren’t a very real issue
for tons of Fortifiers. We know that a lot of people struggle. But the
surest solution is in recovery. The problem with depression and other
negative feelings is that they can be a double edged sword. When we
mess up, they drag us down even further and can lead us to wallow
in our mistakes. Then, even when we are doing well, they linger and
keep us from getting back up. There is a silver lining though. A lot of
the same strategies you are learning as a Fortifier can be applied to
dealing with depression and anxiety.

Step by Step

It is important to start small when approaching these feelings.
Remember to be very patient with yourself. We know how much you
want to get into the problem and just fix it. The trick is that no
matter what, depression isn’t going anywhere overnight; it is
something fades away gradually. You have to be ready to live your
life so that every day and every choice moves you one step closer to
being and feeling better. When that fog settles into our lives, we can’t
let ourselves get lost. You need to move in the right direction to find
your way out. But how do you do that? And where do you start? A
lot of these tips will sound familiar if you know anything about the
Fortify program but they are really important.

Regular Exercise (30 mins of intense movement at least 3 times a

week.)
Regular sleep patterns (8 hours of sleep and going to bed around
the same time every night.)
Getting more sun. (Vitamin D is your friend.)
Practicing relaxation and meditation.
Healthy eating habits.
Taking care of a pet.

The trick with these activities is that they help activate dopamine,
but more importantly they also activate oxytocin. Both of these
compounds are linked to how happy we feel. Dopamine provides a
rush that is more fleeting, while oxytocin is referred to as the
“bonding” chemical. The reason it is called this is because one of the
most critical ways to increase oxytocin levels is quality time with
important people. Healthy, positive and supportive relationships are
critical when dealing with extreme emotions and it comes down to
the difference between these two chemicals.
Think of dopamine as sugar: it tastes good, we get quick energy,
but too much will throw us off and we can crash. Oxytocin is like
protein: our bodies use it more slowly but it is directly related to our
physical growth and long term energy. After being involved with
porn for too long, our dopamine levels are totally out of whack. We
need some now and then but too much can be a problem and it
won’t sustain us. What we need is oxytocin and the best way to get it
is to build our connections with family and friends.
Other positive activities should be done in moderation, and should
also be challenging in some sense. The reward from something we
have worked towards with consistency is much more likely to trigger
oxytocin.

Let Go

“Jealous is the night when the morning comes.”
Depression can give us a pretty twisted view of the world and
especially of ourselves. Sometimes we don’t even notice what we are
doing because we are so used to approaching situations in a negative
light. You Fortifiers already know that will-power or “positive
thinking” won’t cut it. You need a plan.
Take a step in someone else’s shoes. Ask yourself if you would see
yourself this way if you were looking from the perspective of another
person. Don’t let your secrets stand in the way. This is when having
an accountability partner who you’ve honestly shared your struggles
with comes in handy!
Cut yourself some slack. Many depressed people are
perfectionists, holding themselves to impossibly high standards and
then beating themselves up when they fail to meet them. Battle this
source of self-imposed stress by challenging your negative ways of
thinking.
Save problems for later. If you’re having a very negative thought
or experience, don’t try and tackle it if you aren’t in a good mood.
Jot it down somewhere and then go do something fun. When you’re
feeling better come back to it and think about the situation in a new
light. You’ll be surprised how much things change when you look at
them with fresh eyes.
Like we said earlier, you have to be in this for the long haul. Don’t
give up and try not to get discouraged. It may be hard now but there
are better days ahead if you stick with Fortify and your recovery. We
promise.



Combatting the Stress of Porn Addiction




Porn was our escape. A destructive and co-dependent escape, but
an escape nonetheless. When hard times came into our lives, we
would dodge them and go running for a fix rather than dealing with
them head on. The release we felt from using porn would numb us to
the bumps and bruises of life while simultaneously blinding us to the
healthy joys of the world around us. In our quest to avoid pain, we
closed ourselves off to happiness. But now things have changed.
Recovery is breaking down the walls of isolation and addiction and
we can start to feel the little things again. Warmth is returning to
our minds and bodies. But sometimes those same old negative
feelings creep back in.

As addicts we trained ourselves not deal with negativity. When
pain, pressure, worry, discomfort, or boredom come into our lives,
they cause stress. Stress is a huge trigger for most recovering addicts.
However, like almost anything in recovery, you can turn it into a
positive experience.
There are two things we need to know about the stress in our lives
in order to harness it.
First, where does it come from, or what kind of stress is it?
Second, how are we responding to stress?
Let’s start with the different kinds of stress.

Doing Too Little

This is probably the most common form of stress among addicts.
Usually when we think of stress in our lives we think it’s because
there is too much going on. However, people often feel the most
stress because they are doing too little.
Think of this scenario: You know you have a test coming up that
you need to study for but instead you binge watch something on
Netflix. You then perform poorly on the test and now all of the
sudden there is more pressure on future tests, you are concerned
about failing the class and considering the impact that could have on
your academic career.
When we aren’t prioritizing our lives and taking care of our
responsibilities, small things can tend to snowball until they feel out
of control. Even when we try to brush them off they are still there
waiting for us. Taking time to accomplish important tasks, or just
getting some little things done, you will feel stress begin to ease up.
Life will feel more manageable and you will feel stronger. Like the
saying goes, don’t sweat the small stuff and it’s all small stuff.

Doing Too Much

Fortifiers can fall into this trap because they want to fix
everything and they want to fix it all right now. We are so eager to
be free from our addictions that sometimes we stuff our lives with
anything and everything that will push porn out. Sometimes though,
that can bring stress in.
We need to learn to walk before we run and dealing with these
things can be new for us.
You are the only one who can really decide what needs to be
changed in your life but just remember that there is no shame in
being human. Biting off more than you can chew won’t help you or
anyone else.

Just Because Stress

 Life happens, and there isn’t too much to say about it. The only
thing to remember is that not all stress has to do with your actions.
Addicts can tend to take all negative feelings and combine them with
a sense of blame but that is never helpful.
The most important thing about any of the three forms of stress
is how you deal with it.

Healthy Response, Healthy Growth

Like we already said, stress is a trigger so treat it like one. Use the
skills like STAR and Urge Surfing to move past your stress in the
same way you would anything else.
If those aren’t quite what you need here are a couple more tips:
1. Talk about It: Calmly discussing your situation with someone
can be a great way for you to put it in perspective. Even if you’re
talking to yourself… no joke. Try it.
2. Laugh it off: Again. No joke. Laughing increases your oxygen
supply and stimulates the production of endorphins. Endorphins
make you feel happy!
3. Exercise: Ok, we know, we talk about this in almost every
article. But it’s a big deal. 20-30 minutes of breaking a sweat just 3
times a week can lower stress.
4. Get real: Learn from your strengths and weaknesses. Let go of
the past and put your mistakes behind you.
5. Think positively: Choose to adopt a good attitude. Don’t think
or say things that put yourself down. Find the silver lining and use it.
A positive perspective can be the most crucial part at keeping stress
at bay and empowering yourself.


The Porn-Free Diet



So many things in our lives can either contribute to our addictions
or our recovery, but not all of them are obvious or direct. The biggest
factor when it comes to successful recovery is doing the little things
when it comes to your health, specifically diet, sleep, and exercise.
Depending on the lifestyles choices we make, these little things can
either supercharge our recovery or drag us down.

We are what we eat

Our diet is probably the most difficult to identify and change
because we don’t always feel the immediate effects of the food we
eat. Unlike exercise where you feel endorphins as soon as you finish,
or feeling terrible as soon as you wake up because you stayed up all
night long, the effects of a diet aren’t always readily apparent. Think
about it, you don’t gain weight after eating one donut. It is a gradual
process. This is exactly why diet is so important. Not only does our
body’s reaction to certain foods mirror our reaction to porn
(dopamine release, cravings, etc.) but a good diet is all
about consistency, habit, and self-control, three things that
definitely apply to recovery.
Here are some of the do’s and don’ts of food that can help your
on your way to building a positive porn-free life.

Sugar

Here’s the science: sugary foods have repeatedly been shown to
trigger the reward centers in our brain. This process is closely related
to dopamine release, which means sugar can actually become a
trigger. Humans have evolved to respond to sugar for survival. Quick
and easy energy stores were hard to come by when we lived in caves,
but now, high-fructose corn syrup gives us instant satisfaction. While
this isn’t ideal for our health, waiting around a few thousand years
for our genetic code to re-write itself is probably a bad plan. So just
like in recovery, self-control is key. Too much sugar messes up our
energy levels, libido, and our ability to get rid of toxins. In some
cases it has also been linked to the same emotional and mental
issues like anxiety and depression. Sound familiar?

Consistency is key

 Don’t skip meals and don’t binge. This disorganized habit messes
up your metabolism and make it harder for your body to properly
use what you give it. Health reasons aside, inconsistent eating
patterns usually go hand-in-hand with a lifestyle that is messy and
out of control. For example, sleeping late instead of getting up in
time to eat breakfast is a small example of letting things happen to
you instead of you making things happen. Self-control is huge in
recovery and eating at regular times is a great way to practice that.
Avoiding binging is huge as well. How often have you held off
watching porn for while just to fall back into and go overboard? With
food, binging is just as unhealthy. Eat small healthy snacks
throughout the day and be sure to have three nutritious regular
meals. Grab an apple for after breakfast and a granola bar for
between lunch and dinner. Consistency and self-control are the
foundation to a healthy diet and overall lifestyle.

You’re also what you drink

This is sort of an extension of the principles we discussed when
dealing with sugar but drinks deserve their own category because
there is so much to watch out for. Our bodies digest liquids much
easier than solids, which means we can be more affected by their
contents. On top of this, so many different types of drinks are
unbelievably unhealthy. Alcoholic beverages, energy drinks, anything
high in caffeine or caffeine substitutes, sodas (even “diet” drinks, still
bad) and most juices from concentrate are the top culprits. All of
these drinks are notorious for sugar content, and not having much
nutritional value. Instead of going through every ingredient that we
can’t even pronounce, try this instead: drink water. Water is how our
body gets rid of what we don’t need and replenishes our hydration
stores. If we are drinking liquids full of sugar and who knows what
else, we will feel the effects. Water may not be the most exciting
choice, but trust us, once you get in the habit, you’ll feel refreshed
with every glass of H20.

Eat like a human

 If you’re reading this and getting totally stoked for a health
overhaul that consists of eating only kale and protein powder, please
stop. Diet fads can often be as unhealthy as they are healthy. For
example, everyone hates on carbs, but good carbs are necessary to
sustain proper hormone development in your body. Hormones are
also totally thrown off by something else: frequent porn viewing.
Your hormones not only control your sexual health but also things
like your hair and skin health, muscle development, bone density and
energy levels. Basically, just eat food that can contribute to a
balanced life. Include all the food groups and broaden your dietary
horizons. You should also try to eat food that actually has to be
prepared, whether that be a couple eggs in the morning or even a
small pizza that doesn’t come in a box. This is the easiest way to
avoid always eating high-sugar, high-starch and processed foods.
The second benefit is that you now have one more healthy activity in
your life instead of porn. Cooking your own food is productive in
more ways than one. It’s all about being informed and being in
balance. Take care of your body and your brain will thank you.





Chapter 1.1 - Insight

"Superficial conditioning (or learning) can be summed up as, ‘So

this is how people have sex and this is how I should do it.’
Unconscious sexual conditioning can be summed up as, ‘This is what
turns me on’ or, at a brain level, ‘This is what jacks up my dopamine’.
It could be as simple as preferring redheads. Or maybe dainty feet or
pecs appeal more than breasts.
However our preferences arise, our brains evolved to record what
turns us on. This phenomenon rests on a crucial neural principle:
Nerve cells that fire together wire together. Briefly, the brain links
together the nerve cells for sexual excitement (in the reward circuit)
with the nerve cells that store memories of the events associated
with the excitement."

"In 2004 Swedish researchers found that 99% of young men had
consumed pornography. That's ancient history in terms of porn's
delivery, yet more than half felt it had had an impact on their sexual
behaviour.[71]
Even if you're watching tame porn and haven't developed any porn-
induced fetishes, the issue of how you get your jollies can have
repercussions. If you use internet porn, you may be training yourself
for the role of voyeur or to need the option of clicking to something
more arousing at the least drop in your dopamine, or to search and
search for just the right scene for maximum climax. Also, you may be
masturbating in a hunched-over position – or watching your
smartphone in bed nightly."

"Spending years before your first kiss hunched over a screen with 10
tabs open, mastering the dubious skills of learning to masturbate
with your left hand and hunting for sex acts your dad never heard of,
does not prepare you for fumbling your way to first base, let alone
satisfying lovemaking."

"Are We Really Talking About Addiction Here?


Some psychologists and clinicians outside the addiction-neuroscience
field claim it is a mistake to employ addiction science to understand
behaviours like compulsive gambling and out of control consumption
of internet pornography. They argue that addiction only makes sense
when talking about substances like heroin, alcohol or nicotine."

"Unlike smoking, porn addiction is tied to an underlying biological

need, which merges with the addiction and makes everything more
difficult."


Via Brain on Porn by Garry Wilson



"Already, some seventy brain studies on internet addicts reveal the
presence of the same core brain changes seen in substance addicts.
[87] If internet use itself is potentially addictive, then obviously
internet porn use is too."

"Predicting compulsive Internet use: it's all about sex!" Dutch

researchers found that online erotica has the highest addictive
potential of all online applications (with online gaming second).[88]
This makes perfect sense because addictive drugs only cause
addiction because they magnify or inhibit brain mechanisms already
in place for natural rewards, such as sexual arousal."

"The more porn used, the less reward activation when sexual images
were flashed on the screen. A possible explanation is that heavy
users eventually need more stimulation to fire up their reward
circuitry. Said the researchers, ‘This is in line with the hypothesis that
intense exposure to pornographic stimuli results in a downregulation
of the natural neural response to sexual stimuli."
"To sum up: More porn use correlated with less gray matter and
reduced reward activity (in the dorsal striatum) when viewing sexual
images. More porn use also correlated with weakened connections to
the seat of our willpower, the frontal cortex."


Via Brain on Porn by Garry Wilson
Chapter 2 - Let's Face it

4 Scientific Studies That Prove Porn Can Be Beaten

We talk a lot about the doom and gloom of porn addiction. How
it will affect our brains, ruin relationships, etc, etc. That information
can be important and help us create better strategies for our
recovery but let’s be honest; it can also be really depressing. So let’s
look at the other side of the equation, most of the science that
supports how harmful porn can be also proves that recovery is
possible. More than possible; biological.

Once porn is left behind, the brain pathways it created will start
to fade. ● Doidge, Norman. The Brain that Changes Itself. New
York: Viking, 2007. —

Have you heard the “feed the right wolf” analogy? If not, it’s
pretty simple.
If there are two metaphorical wolves locked in a power struggle,
you can decide the outcome by choosing to feed one or the other. As
one influence or “wolf” becomes stronger the other becomes weaker.
This is exactly what happened when we started getting involved with
porn, we kept feeding it and it got stronger. If we turn the tables it
can be our way out.
As we build positive influences into our lives and gain more and
more distance from pornography the pathways in our brain that tell
us we need it will start to shrink. It will be slow but it will happen.

When a brain that has become accustomed to chronic

overstimulation stops getting that overstimulation,
neurochemical changes in the brain start happening. As a result,
many users report withdrawal symptoms. ● Avena, N. M. and P.
V. Rada. “Cholinergic modulation of Food and Drug Satiety and
 Withdrawal.” Physiology & Behavior 106, no. 3 (2012): 332–36.
—

This might sound bad but it is actually very good. Like a
marathon runner who learns to love the burn because it means they
are growing stronger and faster we can celebrate the pain.
Withdrawal sucks and it can be frustrating but it means our brain is
changing. Instead of looking at it as evidence of how messed up you
are think of it like burning calories or soreness after a workout.
And guess what? People have found that when they approach
their withdrawal symptoms with this type of positivity they find
them less powerful and shorter. So it’s a win-win.

The brain can regain sensitivity to healthy, everyday activities. ●

Lisle, Douglas and Alan Goldhamer. The Pleasure Trap.
Summertown, TN: Healthy Living Publications. —

One of the main parts of our brain that is affected by porn use is
our reward center. Basically what happens is that thing gets over-
clocked. This results in it producing less of the the “happy chemicals”
(dopamine, serotonin, adrenaline, etc) and also becomes less
responsive to them. Which means it takes more to make us feel
good.
If we eliminate porn as our main source of these chemical releases
our brain will start looking for new ones. We need start to
connecting to positive things in our live that support our physical,
emotional, mental and social health. These connections might start
off small but they will grow and eventually replace the old neural
pathways.

Research indicates that damaged frontal lobes can recover once

constant overstimulation stops. ● Kim, Seog Ju, In Kyoon Lyoo,
Jaeuk Hwang, Ain Chung, Young Hoon Sung, Jihyun Kim, Do-
 Hoon Kwon, Kee Hyun Chang, and Perry Renshaw. “Prefrontal
Grey-matter Changes in Short-term and Long-term Abstinent
Methamphetamine Abusers.” The International Journal of
Neuropsychopharmocology, 9 (2006): 221–28.

Addiction can cause actual brain-damage, the most common of

which is frontal-lobe shrinkage. This is the part of the brain that
deals primarily with choice, logic and reasoning. This change is one
of the main reasons scientists believe addictions can become so
powerful, it’s like we’re missing the part of our brain that helps us
make good choices.

What’s the silver lining?

It grows back!
Like anything it takes time but victory after victory will make a
difference. The coolest part is that as our brain gets healthier it can
theoretically get easier. Recovery teaches us core principles and
builds specific habits that support the development of that decision-
making part of our brain. Think of it like a muscle that gets bigger
and stronger the more you use it.
All it takes is practice.



10 Excuses That Will Keep You Watching Porn




Addiction teaches us to rationalize and justify. Over time we get
really good at making excuses for ourselves to act out and we keep
buying into our own lies. There is no end to what a porn addict can
come up with in the moment; we look for any and every reason to
act out. Fortifiers need to do some serious soul-searching to find out
what their biggest excuses are. We aren’t telling you this to make
you feel bad, we just hope that this list will help you identify some
of the excuses that are holding you back.

Here are the top 10 excuses we hear most at Fortify HQ:

This is the last time.

There will never be a last time as long as you keep telling
yourself this. Accept that you have a problem and realize that
recovery is a constant road of victories and setbacks. The sooner
you realize that relying on your own strength (or “white-
knuckling it” as well call it) won’t work, the closer you are to
real change.
It could be worse.
A lot of things could be worse, but recovery is about what can be
better. Focus on your potential, not your rock bottom. If we
know anything about porn addiction, it’s that it will get worse if
we let it. Realize that what you’re doing is harmful and commit
to getting healthy.
I’m not hurting anyone.
Your addiction is actually hurting a lot of people, including
yourself. If you don’t already know, studies have shown that
pornography is directly tied to emotional and sexual
dissatisfaction in relationships. Not to mention all of the
emotional, mental and physical ramifications from addiction
that you’ll end up dealing with yourself. All the problems that
porn creates make it so difficult, if not impossible, to freely give
all of yourself to your loved ones.
This type of porn isn’t as bad.
This one can be subtle. A lot of the time we will let ourselves get
close to things we know are triggers because they maybe aren’t
technically pornographic, or they are “just” softcore. Sometimes
we just personalize the situation to convince ourselves that some
kind of porn is okay for us, telling ourselves that we are lonely
or even that we “deserve it.” No porn is good or even okay. Stay
away from the cliff’s edge and you’ll never be in danger of
falling.
I need the release. I’m so stressed/worried/upset/bored.
This is just the porn-addicted version of your brain talking, not
your healthy one. Be smarter than your brain. We all need to
vent at some point, so do it positively. Slipping back into
harmful habits when times get tough is only going to make
things tougher.
Everybody does it and they’re fine. It’s a natural release.
Maybe other people watch porn and live well… but can you? If
you’re reading this and you’re enlisted in the Fortify Program,
odds are you can’t. Don’t compare yourself to other people. This
is your life and your recovery. You know that there’s nothing
healthy about your urges to watch porn and using this
justification will throw you back into the endless addiction cycle.
I’m already screwed up, why stop now?
Remember: YOU ARE NOT YOUR ADDICTION. This is one of the
most important things you need to remind yourself, day in and
day out. You’re not a bad person because you struggle with this,
you’re a great person because you’re doing something to change
for the better.
I had a setback so I might as well take advantage of it and
binge.
This one is a huge culprit for turning a moment of weakness into
a massive setback in your recovery. Learning to dust yourself off
and turn things around quickly is an immensely important skill
for Fortifiers. Remember that setbacks are a part of recovery
and that they are motivation to press on, not permission to dig
yourself deeper.
I need it to fall asleep.
Addiction can build seemingly normal routines into our lives that
can be really hard to break. Sometimes our triggers are based on
a time of day, a location, or even something as simple as a
sound. It might sound crazy but there are things in our lives that
inadvertently become related to our addiction. These types of
triggers are powerful and can easily turn into part of our daily
routines. Recognize the difference between a normal, healthy
routine and one that your addiction has created.


1. I can’t stop making excuses.

Look around at your life to find the excuses you are using. Make
a list and keep it with you. When one of these rationalizations
creeps into your thoughts, you will be able to recognize and
dismiss it. And remember, thinking of these things doesn’t make
you perverted or bad. In fact, as we start to sift through
thoughts and rely on the ones that support our recovery, we will
find more trust and confidence in ourselves.

Chapter 2.1 - Insight

"Dysfunctional stress circuits,[114] which can make even minor

stress lead to cravings and relapse because they activate powerful
sensitised pathways.
To sum up, if these neuroplastic changes could speak, desensitisation
would be moaning, ‘I can't get no satisfaction’. At the same time,
sensitisation would be poking you in the ribs saying, ‘hey, I’ve got just
what you need’, which happens to be the very thing that caused the
desensitisation. Hypofrontality would be shrugging and sighing, ‘bad
idea, but I can't stop you’. Dysfunctional stress circuits would be
screaming, ‘I NEED something NOW to take the edge off!"

"A forthcoming series of studies by Cambridge University addiction

neuroscience experts isolated actual internet porn addicts and
examined their brains.[93] The first of the series has been published,
and the lead researcher said:
There are clear differences in brain activity between patients who
have compulsive sexual behaviour and healthy volunteers. These
differences mirror those of drug addicts’[94] … I think [ours is] a
study that can help people understand that this is a real pathology,
this is a real disorder, so people will not dismiss compulsive sexual
behaviour as something moralistic. ... This is not different from how
pathologic gambling
and substance addiction were viewed several years ago.[95]
The Cambridge team discovered that, in addicts, the reward centre
(nucleus accumbens) showed hyper-reactivity to porn cues (hardcore
video clips). This is evidence of sensitisation, explained more fully
below, which powers cravings in addicts. Incidentally, women porn
users also recorded increased cue-reactivity (as compared with
controls) in a recent German study.[96]

In contrast, when the Max Planck team (above) looked at non-
addicted porn users' brains they found less activation of another
region of the reward circuit. This is evidence of desensitisation, or a
numbed responsiveness.
In analysing the Max Planck results, the Cambridge team
hypothesised that the brain responses to porn might differ between
non-addicts and addicts."

"In short, perhaps the video clips were proper cues for today's users
of streaming HD hardcore porn while brief stills were a closer
representation of everyday erotic visuals.
In any case, both hyper-reactivity to addiction cues (hardcore video)
and reduced sexual responsiveness to tamer sexual visuals are not
surprising in porn overconsumers. Both cue-reactivity and a reduced
pleasure response are often seen in addicts of all kinds."

"No doubt more brain studies on porn addicts are on the way, but
already addiction specialists maintain that all addiction is one
condition. It doesn't matter whether it entails sexual behaviour,
gambling, alcohol, nicotine, heroin or crystal meth – many of which
addiction neuroscientists have studied for decades. Hundreds of brain
studies on behavioural and substance addiction confirm that all
addictions modify the same fundamental brain mechanisms[98] and
produce a recognized set of anatomical and chemical alterations.[99]
(More on these in a moment."

"QUESTION: This new definition of addiction refers to addiction

involving gambling, food, and sexual behaviours. Does ASAM really
believe that food and sex are addicting?
ANSWER: The new ASAM definition makes a departure from equating
addiction with just substance dependence, by describing how
addiction is also related to behaviours that are rewarding. ... This
definition says that addiction is about functioning and brain circuitry
and how the structure and function of the brains of persons with
addiction differ from the structure and function of the brains of
persons who do not have addiction. ... Food and sexual behaviours
and gambling behaviours can be associated with
the ‘pathological pursuit of rewards’ described in this new definition
of addiction."


Via Brain on Porn by Garry Wilson
Chapter 3 - Let's Face It (Part1)

How Not Watching Porn Will Also Make You Live Longer


Jane McGonigal is a game designer. She has spent her life
studying what makes games good, interesting and even healthy.
Through this research and some very traumatic life experience of her
own, she has discovered some very simple principles that can help
you live happier and longer.


The best part? She made it all into a game.


The Game Of Life

McGonigal talks about the four ways we can improve our health
and our lives: physically, emotionally, mentally, and socially. She
calls them resistances, meaning if we are strong in each of these
categories we will be resilient and be able to handle whatever life
throws our way. In the Fortify Program, we refer to these things most
commonly as connections.
An addiction focuses all of our energy on one unhealthy outlet,
ignoring all others. We begin to connect with only one thing, which
causes other important connections in our lives to dissolve. The most
basic way to explaining recovery from addiction is not about
abstinence but about rebuilding connections to the big beautiful
world around us. This is the nature of the game Jane McGonigal
describes, and really it is the point of the game of life. To live and be
happy and connect.
Powering Up
Fortifiers often begin to do this naturally but McGonigal’s analogy
is perfect for implementing Battle Strategies into your recovery. She
introduces a point system in her app, SuperBetter, that is a simple
way to try to build positive and healthy connections every day.
 Think of it like your life stats. Go for a jog? +1 physical
connection. Call your grandma you haven’t talked to in a while? +1
social connection.

If you incorporate one activity for each of these categories into
your daily routine, you will be well on your way to solid recovery—
and you’ll actually have fun along the way. This is important because
it builds variety in your life. Like we said earlier, addiction is when
you become unhealthily focused on one unhealthy thing. You need to
build all the positive aspects of your life to create an atmosphere of
genuine recovery. Building longer and longer streaks of daily victories
over your addiction will replace your addiction with a positive, joyful
life.




The 4 Types of People You Need To Tell About Your Porn Addiction




Anyone who has tried to quit watching porn probably knows that
it is a lot harder to do alone. This is because pornography feeds off
of our isolation and makes it harder to get help. Even though it’s
hard, involving important people in our journey to recovery is a huge
step for almost every Fortifier.
But those pesky questions still remain: who exactly should I talk
to? Should I tell all of them, or just a couple? What if they don’t
understand or judge me? And more than that, how do we get around
the guilt, shame and embarrassment I feel about my addiction?
No two people struggling with a porn addiction will have the
same answers when dealing with these questions. But there are
people who can help you navigate them. The following list details
the different categories of people in your life whom you need to talk
to about your struggle. A lot of these categories will overlap, but
that’s ok. There is no real limit to who you should tell, as long as it’s
going to help. Confiding in someone about your journey to recovery
is a personal choice that you should consider carefully, but it doesn’t
have to be a huge deal. Because let’s be honest, most of us could use
all the help we can get.

The People Who Take Care Of You

This could mean something very different for a lot of people but it
is a good place to start. Confide in the people who you respect, look
up to, and have qualities you want to develop in yourself. For many
of us this is a parent, spouse, or other older relative. But for others,
your main caretaker could exist outside your family. Often people
will talk to school counselors or religious leaders when needing
advice and guidance. Whatever your situation, the key here is to seek
out someone who you know has your best interest at heart and is
capable of investing in your recovery.

The People You Love

The people in this category also fall into the category above but
this one could be a little different for some. Regardless of whether
your relationship is romantic or platonic, these relationships are the
ones entirely based upon honesty and communication. Opening up to
the people you are closest to gives you a chance to grow together
through vulnerability. Being completely open and vulnerable with
these people will be very rewarding and teach you to trust yourself.

The People You Trust

We understand that not everyone has an ideal family or social
life. In many cases it can be very difficult for people to find someone
who can be a firm part of their recovery. When looking at your
friends and peers, make sure you choose someone who you can
trust. An accountability partner should always be someone who
understands what you are up against and wants to help you meet
your goals. This group contains the lion-hearted friends that you
know will always have your back. Stay true to them by being open
with them and they will reward you with their undying support.

The People Who Need Your Help

As you begin to open up and share with those around you, it is
likely you will discover others going through the same thing. This can
be a great opportunity for the both of you. Forming a close-knit
group of those who are on the journey to recovery is an amazing
resource. It is not something that you should force, but if the
opportunity arises, consider it a valuable opportunity. Seeking
change together with a peer that is fully committed to recovery will
strengthen you both immeasurably.

How To Start The Conversation

The first rule of talking about your addiction is honesty. There is
no need for explicit details but there is a need for absolute truth.
Be earnest with whoever you approach in expressing your need
for help and your desire to change. There is no specific formula of
what to say but if you need some inspiration try something like this:
“Hey, can I talk to you for a second? I trust you a lot and that’s
why I am talking to you now. I think I need your help with something
that I’ve been struggling with. I want you to understand that I have
tried to deal with it on my own for some time but feel that to truly
overcome this I will need your help and possibly the help of others.
I’ve been struggling with pornography, and after learning firsthand
how addictive and enslaving it is, I’ve realized that I can’t overcome it
on my own. So I enrolled in the Fortify program—a program
developed for those struggling with an addiction to pornography—
and it has helped me understand the importance of getting someone
like you involved. I feel like I need to be accountable to somebody,
and I’m hoping that you will be willing to be that person. Will you be
my accountability partner? It would help if we got together at least
once a week to talk about my challenges and progress as well as
discuss ideas on how I can continue to improve. I may eventually
invite others as well to strengthen my support and chances of
recovery. This is a very personal issue and I trust that you will keep
this between us until I am comfortable opening up to other people.
Thank you for listening and understanding. That means a lot to me
and I already feel more confident in my ability to beat this with your
help.”

If you’re still stumped you can try breaking the ice with this
Fortify Accountability Partner video: http://bit.ly/1glI7Du. This will
not only help them understand your struggle but also briefly explain
the nature of porn addiction. This video will help to coach
accountability partners on some things they can help with. It isn’t the
most directly personal approach but it can be an easy transition to
starting some good conversations.


Remember, your addiction is a prison built on secrets, lies, shame,
and isolation. Every time you open up to someone in honesty and
love, you are breaking down one of those walls.


3 Ways To Help Heal A Porn-Sick Brain



We get this sentiment expressed to us all the time:

I just feel broken and I don’t know if there is any way to fix it.
This is a sad statement that most everyone can identify with,
especially those who are struggling with an addiction. When dealing
with pornography, it may seem to the addict that there is just no
going back after the countless hours of putting that stuff into their
brain.
We know pornography affects our mental and emotional health.
But while porn addiction does do damage to our brains, it is not
permanent. Think of it just as any other part of the human body—
with time, it always heals. Sometimes it just needs a little help. Think
of a broken arm or leg. While it is a nasty injury, all we need is time,
patience, and of course a good doctor to put us in a cast.
 Our understanding of how the brain works and the treatment of
mental health is growing by day. In the past, things like addiction or
depression have always been seen as personal weakness. The idea of,
if you try harder you can just grit your teeth and get over it.
In today’s society, we know that’s just not how it works. Does that
“white-knuckle” philosophy work with someone who just shattered
their femur? Of course not. And we are learning that mental
obstacles, like addiction, are just the same.
The fact is our brains can heal from the damage done by porn but
they need a little help to get there. Just think of it like giving your
body the time for bones to mend and scars to fade. Here are three
tips to help this healing take place as smoothly as possible.

Grab Some Crutches

You can’t put all of your weight on a sprained ankle, so you need
something to keep you standing. Think of the old song, we all need
somebody to lean on. Find some people that you can rely on and
accept their support. Friends, family or anyone that will help get to
where you need to be will be instrumental in your recovery.
Accountability partners play the exact same role as a faithful set of
crutches. They are there for you when you fall and will always help
you get back up. Use these support systems when you’re feeling hurt
and you’ll be back up and running in no time.

Take Your Medicine

Porn may have spent a long time going to work on your mind,
and it’s going to take some work to reverse the process. An addict’s
lifestyle is often constructed to support their habit, even if they don’t
consciously realize it. You need to drastically reformulate how you
live your life so it supports your recovery, not your addiction. This is
called self-care. It is basically having a concrete plan and a daily
routine that keeps you on track. Keep to the schedule and you’ll be
on the path to full health. Deviate from it and you’ll be back in a
mental wheelchair in no time.
Try some of these helpful meds:
 – Get good sleep and wake up at a respectable time.
– Read a motivational quote to start your day.
– Try to eat healthier.
– Stay active.
– Stay social.
– Identify and avoid triggers.
– Lower social media usage and other unnecessary screen time.
All these forms of healthy self-medicating promote positive
growth in your life. Veteran Fortifiers often sit down and schedule
every minute of their day until they begin to build truly positive
habits.

Strengthen Your Immune System

In this digital age, we will never fully be able to get out of
pornography’s reach, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to put
up the biggest barrier possible. Work with the people closest to you
to establish internet protection and lower access on all your devices.
Remain accountable to them and stay honest. Admitting you have a
problem is a big first step. Know your weaknesses and work on
strengthening them. Know where your trouble areas are and
avoid/eliminate them all together.
Put yourself in an environment where you have the space to heal
and people who want to see back on your feet. The steps toward
recovery aren’t always easy, but they are totally worth feeling
100%.



4 Triggers That Are Slipping Under Your Radar



Fortifiers need to always be on the lookout because porn is
everywhere. Like the alcoholic who won’t even eat rum cake, we need
to know our weaknesses, no matter how small. Recognizing the
enemy is a very important and ongoing part of recovery. Becoming
aware of the reality of your addiction is the first step to constantly
arming yourself against triggers. While our addictions and our
weaknesses don’t define us, we can’t let them consume us either.
Take an inventory of your life and look at what needs to change.
Some things might be obvious and can take place right away. Others
you might have to do some soul searching for. Frequently revisit the
question of how you can shape your life to support your recovery.
Revisit Battle Strategies, your Battle Tracker and all of your
responses from the Fortify Program to identify weak spots and
strengthen them.
As for today, here is a quick and easy checklist to run through and
see if you are doing everything you can to set yourself up for a
porn-free life. Take an honest mental inventory and apply each
category to your own personal life.

1. Social Media

Not all online porn comes straight from the big bad porn
industry. Lots of people actively support and distribute pornographic
content. Some sites are worse than others but there is some level of
triggering content on almost any site with a search bar, and that
includes social media. Limiting your time on these apps can be a
really helpful. It is usually when we get bored or restless that the
urges inevitably starting growing. Try setting daily limits or going on
social media diets where you try to browse less time than you
normally would. Not only is this going to reduce the chance of being
exposed to something, but it will be great practice in building a
healthy lifestyle.

2. Dating Apps

Kind of like social media but with a more personal purpose,
dating apps are now a legitimate way of meeting people. They can
be fun and helpful but they can also be very dangerous for triggers.
Many of apps are marketed in very sexual ways and are used as
nothing more than quick hook-ups or sexting. Also, remember that
even the idea behind dating apps can be a trigger. If you’re not
careful, you can find yourself using dating apps to reduce a person
down to a couple of photos and a short bio, leaving nothing more
than a little online blip to make superficial judgements about. Not
exactly the best way for us to practice getting to know people and
stop objectifying. Try to keep your relationships to the real world
and learn how to appreciate people for who they are, not how they
come across online.

3. Stuff That “Isn’t That Bad”

You know the stuff we’re talking about here: shows, movies or
games that feature content that isn’t necessarily pornographic but is
just the right amount of suggestive. We get that these things can be
really entertaining, but you need to ask yourself, is it worth it? Don’t
jeopardize your recovery for something as common as a trashy
reality TV show or rated M video game. Basically, just be honest with
yourself. Some people will have personal triggers that have nothing
to do with explicit content. For example, here’s a recent message we
got from a Fortifier:
I used to justify looking at porn by saying if it wasn’t real people
it was ok, so I would search for drawn or animated stuff. This lead
me to find things that featured characters from my favorite shows
and games. Now, those games are huge triggers for me. It sucks but I
have to stay away from them now.
-Ryan, 25

4. Those Pesky Urges

The biggest trigger you will need to learn to overcome is yourself.
Porn is everywhere and there are always going to be triggers that
cause urges that could cause you to relapse. While avoiding them is
key, the best thing you can do is train yourself to recognize these
triggers and keep moving past them. Right now, your brain is
programmed to seek things out. So when something flashes in front
of your eyes the natural response is to chase it down. But following
an urge down that rabbit hole can go a lot deeper than you
thought. The white rabbit might be enticing but it leads to no
wonderland at all. Don’t rationalize! Learn to step back from those
moments and see things for what they really are.


Brian’s Story: Freedom Is Right Around The Corner


It is a bright Saturday afternoon. I am sitting in church keenly
following the program. The choir is singing beautifully. Everyone is
looking on.
Just then, a lady comes and sits in the empty chair besides
me. “Hi,” she says and I turn to look. It’s a very good friend of mine.
After a bit of catching up, amidst the singing of the choir, she picks
up my phone and begins perusing through the picture gallery. I begin
shivering. My heart beats faster. I feel like snatching the phone away.
But I can’t. What would she think if I did? All I do is pray that she
doesn’t look at my browser history.
I hold my breath.

I keep a side eye, just in case, becoming more and more restless.
Well, my name is Brian and such were my experiences before I
decided that enough was enough. I would look at pornography all
night long and forget to clear my browser history. I would even, at
times, forget to delete the videos I had downloaded. Anxiety was
something very normal to me then. Anyone going into my room,
perusing through my phone or at my browser history, all made me
very anxious. I lived in constant fear that I would be discovered.
My hopelessness worsened the situation. I considered myself a
wretched being, devoid of any purpose in life. I knew that I could
never make it without help from outside. Inside me there was no
strength, I was too weak. Yet, I hoped for freedom every day. I really
begged that one day help would come.
I kept searching. Filtration and accountability programs had failed
me, making me feel more hopeless. I wanted to stop using porn but I
just could not. Sometimes, I would do nothing the whole day other
than watch porn and masturbate.

 One afternoon, after wasting an entire morning acting out, I lay
in my bed staring at the ceiling. “What should I do?” I asked myself. I
seemed to have no solution. I gave up on thinking. I picked up my
phone again and opened the browser. This time I looked for
something very different. Unconsciously, I typed in “Overcoming
pornography addiction.” As I scrolled through the results, I saw an ad
for Fight The New Drug. I clicked and found myself redirected to The
Fortify Program. I quickly read through. These people are promising
me freedom from porn in one month, I thought. My eyes widened. I
sat straight. Reading closely, I understood what it was all about.
I immediately applied for the teen program. I was exceedingly
excited. When I received an acceptance email, my joy knew no
bounds.
I am now forty days into the program and I can confidently say
that freedom is right around the corner. The program has
empowered me to fight. It has given me a reason to be hopeful.
Although I have relapsed at times, I have always fought again. Only
37% through the program, I am already feeling very uplifted and
hopeful. I rarely have anything to hide. My mood is always constant,
instead of perpetual ups and downs. My life is coming back once
again. The person that I was before porn is slowly coming back. The
fulfillment I find in life nowadays is immense.
I sincerely appreciate the Fortify team for such an initiative. You
are giving people back their lives. This is indeed the noblest pursuit
that man can ever do.
Keep it moving. Keep it strong. Keep fortifying lives.
Chapter 4 - Lies and Lies (Part 3)

22. We can’t protect our kids from porn in today’s world.

There is no question about whether our children will see porn. Their
exposure to it is inevitable.
While making his documentary Porn on the Brain, Martin Daubney
was invited to sit in on a class of teen boys and girls at a school in
North England with a fantastic reputation. Jonny Hunt, a sex
education consultant, stood before a class of uniformed students—
wide-eyed, shy, with high-pitched voices, barely adolescents—and
asked them to write a list of all the sexual terms they knew, no
matter how extreme. When Hunt pinned their lists to the board,
every adult in the room was startled about how much these students
knew: their index of terms surpassed the knowledge even of the
consultant.

After sitting in on several more classes like this one and interviewing
some of the children, Daubney wrote, “It seemed as if the children’s
entire expectation of sex had been defined by what they see in online
porn.” Young girls spoke of how boys expect porn sex in real life.
Boys spoke of how they even stumble across bestiality online.
Daubney asked the teens, “On a scale of one to ten, how likely would
you say it is that boys and girls your age are watching porn online?”
The reply was a chorus of tens, nines, and one eight. All the students
admitted that their parents had no idea what they were watching.1
Eric Spitznagel, writing for Details magazine, says, “By the time
they’re in high school, America’s porn-fed youth have already
amassed an encyclopedic knowledge of smut.”2 Spitznagel was not
writing this out of concern for teens but was looking upon their
experiences with a middle-aged jealousy. Gone are the days of
prepubescent boys stumbling on a father’s stash of magazines in the
closet. Boys and girls now consume hard-core video material that is
readily available to them.
CyberPsychology and Behavior released the results of a study
showing that 93 percent of boys and 62 percent of girls in the United
States see porn before the age of eighteen, and many of these
exposures are not shut-the-laptop-and-walk-away glimpses but
porn binges.3 According to the 2010 Youth Internet Safety Survey, a
quarter of U.S. teens are exposed to porn online when they aren’t
even looking for it.4
The majority of the pornography consumed is accessed on mobile
devices.5 An estimated 31 percent of teens own smartphones, and a
smartphone without restrictions amounts to an X-rated theater in
your pocket.6
Among youth, it is not a matter of merely consuming porn but of
becoming porn. Kim Goldman, director of the Santa Clarita Valley
Youth Project, says, “Of course girls want to emulate this stuff. Girls
talk about feeling like they have to be like what they see on TV.”7
Conservative estimates say that about 20 percent of sixteen-year-
olds and 30 percent of seventeen-year-olds have received a sext (a
sexually explicit text message) on their cell phones.8 Teens use apps
such as Snapchat, Kik, WhatsApp, or iDelete to send nude images of
themselves. Often teens will use Tumblr and Facebook to leak sexts
of their ex-boyfriends or ex-girlfriends—a phenomenon called
“revenge porn”.
I heard Joanna Angel, owner of the porn company Burning Angel,
say that she doesn’t have to coach the young actors doing porn films
for the first time. Having indulged in porn since youth, she said, boys
and girls come to the porn set ready to perform. They enter their
relationships ready to perform too. Pornography is powerful sex
education. One study that surveyed teens suggests that the more
often young people seek online

porn, the more likely they are to have a “recreational” attitude about
sex.9 Among young men who watch porn, 53 percent say that porn
has “inspired” them.10
In the face of such an overwhelming trend among youth, do parents
have any hope of protecting their children?
First, as parents, we should not allow the trends to cloud our
understanding of the role we play. We are not responsible in the
short term for every child on the planet. We are responsible for our
own children. All the grim statistics should not paralyze us into
inactivity.
To help our children to grow up in a pornified world, we must take
the double-pronged strategy of both protecting their minds and
preparing their character.

Protecting Their Mind

Beginning when your children are very young, think holistically about
media choices and access in your home. You must be shrewd about
all the media your kids consume. Remember, pornography exists on
a spectrum of media options. A report from the American
Psychological Association states, “Virtually every media form studied
provides ample evidence of the sexualization of women, including
television, music videos, music lyrics, movies, magazines, sports
media, video games, the Internet, and advertising.”11
You must be the media gatekeepers and never be passive when it
comes to the media choices your children make. Watch TV and
movies with your children. Know what magazines they are reading
and what websites they visit. Be vocal about your values, and ask
critical questions. “Is a woman’s true value bound up in how she
looks?” “Did you notice that this advertisement is drawing attention
to her sex appeal?” Give your

children the language to question the values that are being pushed
through sexual images. If you don’t like a certain TV show, movie, or
piece of music, tell your children why and then be clear about your
expectations.
Some kind of Internet filtering and monitoring is an absolute must.
Make this your personal rule: if I am not willing to monitor it, I will
not provide it or allow it. This rule should go for you as well: if you
install monitoring or filtering software on computers, tablets, and
phones that your children use, do the same for yourself—with
modified settings so that you can get to the places online you need
to go to. This models accountability for your kids.
For a while, I worked for a wonderful software company called
Covenant Eyes, and I saw firsthand from the customers the value of
raising kids with accountability. Especially when kids are young, strict
filtering is a must, but as they get older, you should hold your kids
accountable for where they go online as you loosen the filtering
restrictions. Notice that the focus here should be on accountability,
not on spying. Accountability means that your teens know that their
online footprints are being tracked. You aren’t trying to catch them
red-handed. If kids grow up in a home where tracking isn’t a punitive
measure but simply part of the culture of the home, they are far
more likely to embrace it.
Children should be prepared from a young age to deal with porn
exposure. Even when all the protective measures are in place in your
own home, your child is only as safe as the locker room at school—
where kids are walking around with cell phones full of hard-core
material. Train your child from a young age how to react when porn
appears.
For young children, there’s a fantastic read-aloud book called Good
Pictures Bad Pictures. Author Kristen Jensen does a wonderful job of
warning children about the existence of pornography.

without provoking needless curiosity. The book presents kids with a

simple plan for how to react if they see pornography.

For all children and teens, there must be media limits in the home.
Don’t even make secrecy an option. Cell phones should be monitored
and filtered and should stay out of bedrooms at night. (And if your
teen says that he uses his phone as an alarm clock, remember that
stores still sell alarm clocks and go buy one.) Again, if these rules are
established early, they will not be seen as disciplinary but as wise
principles by which your family operates.



Preparing Their Character

Protective measures are important, but they are not the most
important. In the end, we are raising future adults, not just kids. We
are raising young men and women who will eventually leave home.

and enter a world without filters. It is vital that we prepare them by

fortifying their character.
Sex Education

Teaching kids about sex might sound toe curling to some parents, but
if we neglect to be involved in our children’s sexual maturation, we
will be leaving a massive void that promoters of pornography will be
only too eager to fill.
Sex education, whether we like it or not, begins early. From a young
age, children discover and explore their sexual identity and notice the
basic physical differences in the opposite sex. Even when your
children are young, you can communicate with them about the
dignity and the value of their bodies. Teach your children the names
of body parts and the importance of honoring their bodies and the
bodies of others through modesty and privacy.

Age six in many countries marks a significant shift in a child’s life as

he begins to spend more time in school around peers, and it is in this
setting that children are often exposed to misinformation about sex.
Additionally, around the age of six or seven, children enter a new
stage of cognitive development, when they begin to reason with logic
and imagination. They become more aware of the world around
them, and their intellectual curiosity begins to grow. Also around this
age, a child’s adrenal glands begin to mature, which leads to the
production of natural sexual steroids in the body. Because of these
factors, this is a perfect age for parents to begin having more formal
conversations with their children about specific sexual topics, such as
how life begins. It is also a time to give warnings about sexual
predators.
During the middle childhood years, parents should teach children
about the nature and the purpose of sex—most of all, its power and
beauty. For some parents this might seem absurd. What young child
can really understand these adult topics? The point of this education
is not to overwhelm children with titillating information but to
impress upon them the goodness of sex when it is expressed with
mutual love and affection in marriage.
During this time, make sure to draw a contrast between the goodness
of marital love and the wrongness of exploiting another’s body. You
don’t have to look far for examples. The checkout aisle at the
grocery store will suffice—every magazine cover explodes with
vibrant displays of scantily clad men and women. Simply tell your
children, “Do you see the woman in this photo? Someone has paid
her to show off her body to the world to attract people to buy this
magazine, but we know that the human body is not meant to be
turned into an object like this.”
As kids get older, it is vital for parents to have conversations about
body image and specific sexual behaviors. Parents must become
unflinching realists and prepare themselves for candid conversations.
Once I gave a talk to a group of parents about sex education. While
the overwhelming response to the talk was positive, some parents
said they felt very uncomfortable with my using words such as
“penis” and “vagina” in a public setting. I wanted to say, “No wonder
you don’t talk to your kids about sex. You can’t even listen to
anatomical words in room full of adults who have gathered to talk
about sex.” If this is you, I tell you with the utmost compassion:
please overcome this inhibition. Children and teens need to see that
their parents are reliable sources of knowledge about sex, which
means that conversations about these matters should be considered
normal in the home.
Please don’t mistake my brevity on this subject for ignorance about
the fear parents feel over this issue. I know parents often are afraid
of saying too much too soon. Sadly, this often means that they end
up saying too little too late.
Modeling Love
The sad reality is, children are sexualized because of adults. Adults
are the ones who own multimillion-dollar advertising companies.
Adults are the ones who buy and sell the bodies of others. Adults are
the ones who produce and consume porn. Adults are the ones who
expose children to porn, and sometimes these adults are the
children’s own parents.
If we are going to form the character of our children, we need to
model the kind of person we wish them to become. This starts with
the media we consume ourselves, but it extends beyond this to the
way we relate to one another. We need to take an honest look at
ourselves and ask: Do I show respect for myself and others by the
way I dress, speak, and act? Do I honor and cherish my spouse?

Am I careful to govern the things I look at and think about? Do I set

boundaries to protect my children?
Choose to be a family that upholds the dignity of every person. If
you are a father, be the dad who noticeably turns his head or
changes the channel when a racy image comes on TV. Show affection
to your daughters and take an active role in protecting them by
setting curfews, meeting their friends, and restricting their social life
and social media when necessary. Talk frankly to your sons about
sexual self-control. If you are a mother, be the mom who affirms her
own inner beauty and doesn’t obsess over her looks. Set the example
of modesty for your daughters. If you are married, be the couple
who goes on dates, communicates, and gives each other
compliments. If you are a husband or a wife, be the spouse who
steals kisses in the hallway: show your children what marital love
and tenderness look like so

that the allure of abusive porn sex can’t hold a candle to what
they’ve seen at home.
Setting Boundaries

A child who never suffers the consequences of his bad choices will
soon learn that he can get away with anything. A child who never
learns to respect authority will soon come to believe that all rules
and guidelines are nothing but arbitrary standards that can be
discarded for any momentary pleasure. Such a child is ripe for porn
when he stumbles upon it. This is why children should grow up in
homes where there are clear rules and expectations.
On this point we must be very careful. Too many parents have
discarded the notion of rigid household rules because they associate
this with authoritarianism. They know that kids living in
authoritarian homes are quick to rebel because of power struggles,
and they are correct.
Clinical psychologist Diana Baurmind’s traditional classifications of
parenting styles can be helpful as we consider how to lay ground
rules in the home. There is a major difference between authoritative
and authoritarian parenting.

• Authoritative parents use discipline to instill character in their

children. Authoritarian parents use harsh chastisement to coerce and
to control their children and, when that fails, to inflict pain on their
children to get revenge.
• Authoritative parents accompany their discipline and instruction
with high levels of warmth and grace. Authoritative parents are
often cold and distant.
• Authoritative parents allow children to question the rules because
they know

that dialogue is part of the learning process. Authoritarian parents

are unresponsive to a child’s needs and questions.
Because porn has no rules and feels like a no-risk venture, the child
who believes there are no norms and expectations, or a child who
believes he can easily ignore those expectations, will undoubtedly
become ensnared in sexual media.
Parents should make expectations and standards clear in the home—
not just about matters of sexuality and media choices, but about all
matters that pertain to living wisely. Yes, children will push the
limits, but an authoritative parent knows how to push back in a
manner that communicates authority without sparking a huge power
struggle. Authoritative parents invest time and attention in setting
rules with their children, not just for their children, allowing them to
see the wisdom of the rules that are set.


Nurture and Love

For many reasons, porn can become a refuge for people. In the world
of fantasy, we get a quick fix of erotic pleasure, and in that fantasy
world nothing is expected of us. Amid the pressures of life, a little
porn can feel like well-deserved relief.
This is why, as parents, we need to do everything in our power to
make sure that our homes are not places our kids seek refuge from.
If anything, our homes should be places of refuge, but this cannot
happen if our kids are growing up in an environment of constant
criticism, impatience, self-centeredness, and frustration.
We must remember: there are two kinds of parental authority:
institutional and personal. Institutional authority is the authority
that parents have simply by virtue of being parents: children should
honor their elders because they are their elders. Personal authority is
the kind of authority that parents have by taking visible
responsibility for their children,
showing love, devotion, and affection, and giving children a sense of
power in the choices they make. As parents do this, children yield to
the wisdom their parents impart. Both kinds of authority are
important for parents to use.
Institutional authority is like having your name on the checkbook;
personal authority is like having money in the bank. Some parents
make the mistake of thinking that if they deposit a lot of money in
the account, they’ll never have to write a check. They never put up
any boundaries or make any rules. They have a “just love ’em”
attitude, which means they end up being pushovers. Other parents
make the opposite mistake of believing that they can’t possibly be
out of money because they still have checks in the checkbook. In
other words, they demand obedience from their children “because I
said so”, but their children are exasperated because their homes are
devoid of the kind of encouragement that would help them to
flourish.

There are no guarantees when it comes to parenting because no

parent can control every aspect of a child’s world. But so far as it
depends on us as parents, we must step up to the plate and raise the
kind of children who are ready to respond to a sexualized world. We
must guard their eyes and fortify their hearts. We must teach them
the goodness and the purpose of sex, show them the beauty of
sexual integrity and marital love, give them firm boundaries, and
nurture them with affection and attention.
This isn’t just porn-proof parenting. It is wise parenting.















6. Only religious people oppose porn.

As I wrote in the introduction, this book isn’t a religious offensive

against pornography. Still, you’re reading a book produced by a
large Catholic publishing house; and if you’ve googled my name, you
know that I am Catholic, unashamedly so. I run in circles with many
people who dislike pornography, many of whom are religious to at
least some degree.
The fact is, many people who oppose porn are religious, leading
some to believe that only religious people oppose it.
For instance, psychologist Dr. David Ley says that all the talk about
porn addiction and sex addiction is coming from religious people
advocating their religion’s sexual morality:
They are typically unable to put forth a healthy model of sexuality,
and when they do, it is so transparently conservative and religiously
driven that it’s frightening. Most of the leaders of the sex-addiction
movement are themselves recovering supposed sex addicts and
religious folks. That’s fine, it’s fine for them to be advocating, but
what they’re advocating for is a moral system, not a medical one.1
Dr. Ley appears to be placing a sharp divide between moral and
medical systems and how they view the human person and human
flourishing.
A couple of matters should be made clear at the outset. First, just
because some people oppose porn because it violates the morality
taught by their religion does not mean their cause is wrong. During
the nineteenth-century movement to abolish slavery, many Quakers
opposed the trans-Atlantic slave trade because it violated the
precepts of their religion, which teaches equality. Their religious
motivation did not make their cause wrong.

Second, in a free society people should not be excluded from civil

discourse, or

be discounted as having nothing to contribute to it, just because they

accept the morals taught by their religion. Many people who are
against stealing and murder were taught the Ten Commandments in
their churches or synagogues. Should their upbringing exclude them
from public discussions about violent crime?
Stephen Carter of Yale Law School says this kind of privatizing of
religion is unjust:
Efforts to craft a public square from which religious conversation is
absent, no matter how thoughtfully worked out, will always in the
end say to those of organized religion that they alone, unlike
everyone else, must enter public dialogue only after leaving behind
that part of themselves that they may consider the most vital.2
Every person, whether religious or not, has ideas about what human
flourishing looks like, and he ought to be able to share those ideas in
the public square.

With these concerns out of the way, we can deal squarely with the
myth itself. Is it true that only religious people oppose porn?
Several years ago, the magazine GQ ran a thought-provoking article
about why men should quit looking at porn. The same year that GQ
dished out provocative photos of the hundred “sexiest women of the
twenty-first century”, the magazine also told their readers that
masturbating to images of sexy women might be a bad idea. What
spurred this advice? Editors of the magazine had stumbled upon a
growing group on Reddit.com called NoFap, an online community of
(mostly) men who were challenging each other to put away porn and
masturbation.
This community began not because of religious motivations, but
because its members wanted to see how quitting porn and
masturbation would improve their overall health and well-being.
About 64 percent of NoFappers had developed tastes for porn that
had become extreme or deviant. Among the twenty-seven- to
thirty-one-year-olds in the group, 19 percent were suffering from
premature ejaculation, 25 percent were totally disinterested in sex
with a partner, 31 percent had difficulty reaching orgasm, and 34
percent were experiencing erectile dysfunction. After joining the
NoFap community and quitting their porn habits, 60 percent found
that their sexual function improved.

I had the pleasure of conversing with the founder of the NoFap

community, Alexander Rhodes, who describes himself as an agnostic.
At the time of my interview, most NoFappers considered themselves
atheists or agnostics, and currently there are well over 150,000
online members. When asked why he started the community, Rhodes
told me, “Love is my motivation.” He wants to see people live porn-
free lives because he honestly believes we are better off with out it.
Comparing pornography to cigarettes, he said, “It is always a
harmful thing to consume.”
Men like Rhodes and the thousands of nonreligious individuals in his
online community are not alone in their disdain of pornography. Men
with damaged libidos are not the only ones who think pornography
is a problem; thousands of women do as well. In the 1960s, ‘70s,
and ‘80s, the world saw the rise of a new wave of feminists who
ardently spoke out against the social ills of pornography—and these
same women often also opposed organized religion.
In conclusion, religious people are not the only ones who oppose
porn. There are others who oppose it because personal experience,
social science, or medical research has shown that porn is not
conducive to their well-being.



Chapter 5 - You got Mind Fucked

24. I will always be addicted to porn.

Not long ago Vanity Fair ran a cover story in which actress Jennifer
Lawrence talked about the nude photos she sent to her boyfriend—
which were then hacked and leaked to the public. In her interview she
defended her original nude selfie by saying, “I was in a loving,
healthy, great relationship for four years. It was long distance, and
either your boyfriend is going to look at porn or he’s going to look at
you.”1
This is a sad statement from a woman who has seemingly given in to
the notion—the rather sexist notion—that men are interested in only
one thing and incapable of self-control. In the face of raging
hormones and the ubiquity of porn, her statement implies, men will
inevitably consume porn, and women must become porn themselves
to compete. This is the lie that so many men and women believe.
The more we learn about both the pervasiveness of pornography in
our culture and the impact it can have on the mind, the more we’re
tempted to think that perhaps we’re bound to it.
The fact is, many people are realizing the wonderful truth that life
without porn is not only possible but also much more interesting.
Those entrenched in porn tend to live suffocatingly small lives,
constantly looking for their next fix. Those who begin to find freedom
begin inhabiting a larger, more colorful existence.
Studies are showing that the brain can actually heal itself, even after
years of consuming pornography. As previous chapters of this book
have communicated, porn can and does hijack the neurocircuits of
the brain, but with time and effort, the brain can be given space to
heal itself. For some this can be a long
road. Therapists Wendy and Larry Maltz in their book, The Porn Trap,
state:
Porn’s power to produce experiences of excitement, relaxation, and
escape from pain make it highly addictive. Over time you can come
to depend on it to feel good and require it so you don’t feel bad.
Cravings, preoccupations, and out-of-control behavior with using it
can become commonplace. Porn sex can become your greatest need.
If you have been using porn regularly to “get high,” withdrawal from
porn can be as filled with agitation, depression, and sleeplessness as
detoxing from alcohol, cocaine, and other hard drugs. In fact, people
in porn recovery take an average of eighteen months to heal from
the damage to their dopamine receptors alone.
Practically speaking, although you may feel pornography is simply
an undefeatable foe impossible to overcome, the fact is otherwise. If
you want freedom, you must fight resolutely, implementing tactics
that will enable you to have the time and the space for your brain to
heal. You didn’t get hooked on porn overnight; the craving for it
won’t go away overnight either .

Understand What You’re Fighting(and Not Fighting)

A few years back, when my wife was pregnant with our third child, I
found the book What to Expect When You’re Expecting on the coffee
table. I thought it would be fun to peruse the section about the weird
cravings pregnant women have—you know, pickles mixed with ice
cream and that sort of thing. But there were also some cravings
listed that I didn’t expect, such as a hunger for clay, rocks, ashes,
hair, and laundry starch. This is a condition called pica, and some
speculate that it is due to a nutritional deficiency, particularly of
iron.
Suppose I came home from work one day to find my wife sucking on
a piece of charcoal—weird thought experiment, I know, but stay with
me. There are two unhelpful reactions I could have. I could react in
horror, shaming her for her choice in cuisine. “You are disgusting!
That’s filthy! What were you thinking?” Or I might go to the opposite
extreme,

thinking, “Better not say anything. If she wants to suck on charcoal

in the privacy of her own home, who am I to stop her?” As sensitive
as it might sound, this is an uninformed response. Depending on
what someone is consuming, pica can cause serious medical
problems.
The loving thing to do might be to say, “Honey, just put the charcoal
down. That’s it. . . nice and easy. Let’s go to the kitchen. I’ve got a
nice big steak that I’ll bet you’ll love.”
What does any of this have to do with porn? Well, just as pica is a
distortion in our desire for food, pornography use is a distortion in
our desire for sex. Condemning pica as an unhealthy condition
doesn’t mean I hate food. Similarly, condemning porn as unhealthy
sex doesn’t mean I hate sex. A desire to eat is a sign of health. A
desire to eat nonnutritive substances such as wood, dirt, or glass is
not. A desire for sex is a sign of health. A desire for porn is not.

One of the reasons many people find it difficult to break free from
porn and remain free is that they confuse sexual desire with a
craving for pornography. Whatever protocols you put in place to
distance yourself from pornography, remember: the goal is not the
long-term squelching of sexual desire. The goal is the healing of
your sexual cravings so that you pursue them in a manner that
pushes you toward a healthy and satisfying marital relationship.
Making a U-Turn on the Porn Superhighway
In his terrific little book, Treating Pornography Addiction, Dr. Kevin
Skinner outlines what he calls the “activation sequence”. By this he
means the sequence of events that lead up to looking at
pornography. He outlines six steps in the sequence—the seventh being
actually looking at pornography. We might think of this sequence as
a highway: knowing

these six mile markers along the pornography highway will not only
help us to recognize them when they occur but will also help us to
make a U-turn to escape the habit.

1. Trigger or Stimulus

A trigger or stimulus is something that causes something else. When

we speak of triggers in connection with pornography or
masturbation, we mean those things that initiate the activation
sequence. Understanding our triggers will help us immensely in the
fight against the temptation and can even stop the temptation to
look at porn altogether.
There are obvious triggers, and there are not-so-obvious triggers.
Obvious triggers include things such as getting a Victoria’s Secret
catalogue in the mail, listening to music with raunchy lyrics, seeing
pop-up ads, and so forth. Less obvious triggers include things such
as experiencing a frustrating or over
whelming situation, hearing someone make an emasculating or
bitter comment about us, or being rejected by somebody.
In his book, Dr. Skinner speaks of a client who, when he was a boy,
would hear the sounds of his father beating his mother. To make sure
the boy never got into the middle of the abuse, his mother would
give her son her husband’s Playboy magazines. She would throw
them in his room and say, “Stay here and don’t come out.” This is
how this young man learned to cope with high-stress situations. Is it
any wonder that today, as a thirty-something-year-old, when he
gets stressed out, his body and brain know exactly where to go to
feel better?
Anyone who wants to make a U-turn at his triggers first needs to
know what his triggers are. What sights, sounds, or events tend to
get the motor going? When one becomes aware of his triggers, this
will allow him to be more vigilant

At this step of the activation sequence—actually, at every step—if one

wants to make a U-turn, he needs to turn on his “thinking brain”, the
part of the brain called the prefrontal cortex (which I’ve written
about in previous chapters of this book). This is the part of the brain
that deliberates, that chooses between wise and unwise actions. One
can turn on his prefrontal cortex in several ways, but one of the
easiest is to speak aloud and label what is happening: “This is a
trigger.” By doing this, a person stops being a passive participant,
stops letting his habits stay in the driver seat, and helps himself to
snap out of it.

2. Emotional Response

After the initial trigger comes an emotional response to that trigger.

It could be a sense of excitement or curiosity or anticipation. The
emotion might be something very acute—a sudden feeling


or sensation—or it might be something that builds slowly over
time.

3. The First Thought

This comes almost simultaneously with the emotion. It might be “I

want to watch some porn right now” or “No one has to know” or
“What will I see if I look up ___?”
When the initial emotion and the first thought spring to mind, if one
wants to make a U-turn at these steps, again, the thinking brain
must be activated. One must speak aloud the truth about the matter:
“I feel frustrated, and my habit now is to rush to porn because it
feels comforting” or whatever the scenario happens to be.

4. The Chemical Release

If one keeps moving down this highway, the body will begin gearing
up for watch

ing pornography because this is what the body has been trained to
do. The body will get ready for climax, and the brain will release
chemicals associated with memory, telling itself, “Remember where
you got your fix the last hundred times? That’s where we need to go
next.” Even before pornography is consumed, the body is already
anticipating the event.

5. Body Language

Once the chemicals are released into the system, the body begins to
change. Heart rate increases, palms become sweaty or cold, eyes
dilate, there is a tingling in the groin or the feeling of butterflies in
the stomach, or the muscles tense up.
If one has been mindlessly driving down the porn highway up to this
point, these physical sensations should serve as a big caution sign.
The “gotta have it” feeling should alert someone that it is time to
make an immediate U-turn.

Once again, he should activate the thinking brain: speak aloud the
truth of what is happening. “My body is gearing up to look at porn
because of a chemical release. I need to make an immediate decision
to do something different.”

6. The Battle

At this point, the decision to look at porn or not still needs to be

made, and a battle will ensue. Dr. Skinner calls this the “second
thought”. Pro-versus-con judgments will bounce through the mind
like a lightning-speed game of Ping-Pong. This is the brain’s backup
system trying to throw on the brakes and decide what it really wants
to do.
The mind might think, “No one has to know”, “This is the last time,
then I’m done”, “I’m free to do what I want”, or “I’m eventually going
to give in to this, so I might as well get it over with.” There might be
opposing thoughts such as “What if my girlfriend finds out?”, “My

family would be so disappointed”, “There are better things to do”, or

“I hate the power this has over me.”
Whatever thoughts win this battle will determine the behavior.

7. The Behavior

Assuming nothing has interrupted this activation sequence, the

behavior is consuming porn.
Two Key Strategies
When it comes to making U-turns on this porn highway, there are
two key strategies to employ. The first is for when you find yourself
on the highway already, and the second is for changing your habits
to avoid getting on the highway in the first place.

Strategy 1: The Thinking Brain

I’ve already mentioned the importance of activating the thinking

brain: speaking aloud to yourself key truths, no matter where in the
activation sequence you happen to be. One reason this strategy is so
powerful is that you use verbal cues to wake up to reality and think
about what you’re doing. But this strategy will be more powerful if
you do your homework and prepare for those moments, rather than
assuming you will know how to think on your feet in the heat of the
moment.
Having spoken to countless people who have broken away from the
grip of porn addiction, I offer here some of the best experience-
tested ideas I’ve heard.

1. Educate yourself. Learn as much as you can about the impact porn
has on your life: all the things porn is robbing from your life, the
way it negatively impacts your brain, your body, and your
relationships—even your most cherished relationships. The more you
fill your mind with this information,

the more likely this information will come to mind to interrupt the
activation sequence.

2. Write down your negative and positive motivations. What do you

lose by constantly pursuing pornography all the time? What is it
costing you? What could it cost you? What is it costing society? These
are negative motivations. What do you stand to gain by becoming a
porn-free person? How will your life improve? What kind of man or
woman do you hope to become? These are positive motivations.
Keep a shorthand top-ten list of these motivations on you at all
times—in your wallet or in your purse—and pull it out when you find
yourself in an activation sequence.

3. Write down your exit strategies. It is one thing to take your

thoughts captive. It is another to know what to do next. Before
another activation sequence begins, write down what you

Note: It's possible to be done... the only thing which you need is
action, action... - So Keep going!
plan to do. Think action verbs here. Get up. Walk. Run. Call someone.
Write a letter. Go outside. Write down your plan for predictable
moments of temptation.

4. Finish the fantasy. This might sound counterintuitive, but it is so

practical. When something triggers an initial thought, our mind gets
stuck in a rut of anticipation. Thoughts are focused on what is
coming or what we could be doing. Instead of staying in that rut,
finish the fantasy: picture yourself following through with the action
—walking to your computer, binging on porn for a few hours,
masturbating, and then feeling like a miserable failure as a result.
When we do this, it pushes us past the feeling of anticipation and the
rush of excitement to the reality. We’ll then be in a better state of
mind to think, “This is not the kind of person I want to be.

5. Think about sex. Australian author Frank Sheed wrote that

modern man practically never thinks about sex. He might dream
about it, joke about it, write songs about it—but he doesn’t think
about it. What is the nature of sex? What is its purpose? Is it merely
to “get off”, or does our biology reveal a more meaningful purpose?
As we look at the way the human brain is wired and the way our
sexual organs are designed, we discover that sex is about both
openness to new life and bonding to another person in love. It is a
breathtakingly more exciting picture of sex than what Playboy,
Cosmo, or Fifty Shades of Stupid paints for us. These are the
thoughts we can use when the activation sequence is underway. We
can think, “This is not what my sexuality is for, just objectifying self-
pleasure. My sexuality is for the creation of life and the creation of
love.

Strategy 2: Change Your Habits

Ideally the best way to escape the porn superhighway is never to get
on it in the first place. This means avoiding as many triggers as
possible.
Now, it is important to note that no one can actually avoid every
potential trigger. One of your triggers might be frustration, and you
are certain to enter potentially frustrating situations. If seeing a racy
ad on TV or in a magazine is one of your triggers, unless you plan to
live in a cave somewhere, you will likely run into sexualized media on
occasion.
Still, there are many triggers you can avoid. Is one of your triggers
being alone on your phone with the bedroom door closed? Change
something about that habit. Resolve not to shut your door, or never
to bring your laptop into your bedroom, or get accountability
software such as Covenant Eyes on your computer and have a good
friend start receiving regular e-mailed reports of your Internet.

activity. In other words, get rid of the option of anonymity and

secrecy.
Is one of your triggers a certain kind of music? Stop listening to it. Is
one of your triggers a certain channel on TV? Get rid of your cable
subscription. Do you have porn stored somewhere in your home?
Throw it out. Do you have unlimited access to the Internet through
your phone? Put some kind of filtering or accountability program in
place. Do you pass an “adult” store on the way home from work? Go
a different way.
All of this might seem over the top, but if porn were easy to quit, you
probably wouldn’t be reading this chapter right now. A lot of people
try to quit without closing all the access points to porn. To quote Dr.
Phil, “How’s that working for you?”
Remember this mantra: “When you’re at your best, plan for your
worst.” Right now, if you have a resolve to avoid porn, remember: a
day will likely come when

you won’t have that resolve, so make sure you have protections in
place.
If you understand the activation sequence, try to prevent triggers,
and then activate your thinking brain when the triggers come, you
can be successful.
Lastly, when you are making your plans to quit pornography, it is
important to set small, measurable goals. Don’t make promises like
“I’ll never watch porn again.” Freedom is one day at a time. If you
view freedom from porn as a destination, you’ll almost certainly
remain disappointed. This is because freedom is not so much a
destination we reach as much as it is a daily decision we make. Your
goal today is not “I’ll never look at porn again.” Instead it’s “Today I
resolve to be the person I want to be, and one thing that means is
this: today I will not get sucked into pornography.” Real freedom is a
lifetime of todays, a lifetime of moment-by-moment choices. Don’t
worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will be anxious for itself.

Freedom Is Possible

French novelist Virginie Despentes has reportedly said that

consuming pornography does not lead to more sex; it leads to more
porn. Much like eating McDonald’s everyday will accustom you to
food that (although enjoyable) is essentially not food, pornography
conditions the consumer to being satisfied with an impression of
extreme sex rather than the real.
Porn promises freedom, but it enslaves us. It promises excitement,
but it ends up boring us. It promises us “adult” entertainment, yet it
makes us increasingly juvenile. It promises intimacy, but leads to
isolation.
The good news is that freedom is possible and something so much
better awaits us on the other side.


APPENDIX 1

Quick Findings from the Experts

I hope that in addition to helping you to understand more about the

destructive nature of porn on individuals, relationships, and society,
this book will help you to explain these things to others. To that end,
in addition to the many research findings already discussed, in this
appendix I have provided findings concerning porn’s effects on (1) the
brain, (2) emotional health, (3) sexual tastes, (4) sexual violence, (5)
erectile dysfunction, (6) marriage, and (7) adolescence.
Porn and the Brain

1. When researchers compared brain scans of porn users with scans

of nonusers, they found that the more porn the person had used, the
less his reward center activated when porn images were flashed on a
screen.1 The researchers said, “This is in line with the hypothesis that
intense exposure of pornographic stimuli results in a downregulation
of the natural neural response to sexual stimuli.”

2. With a dulled reward center, a person can’t feel dopamine’s effects

as well as they used to. As a result, the porn a person is using can
stop producing the same excitement it did before. This leads many
users to go in search of more hard-core material to get a bigger
dopamine burst.

3. People with Internet addiction have been found to have less gray
matter in several important areas of the brain, including the frontal
lobes (which oversee things such as planning, prioritizing, and
controlling impulses), the striatum (which is involved with the reward
center and with

self-control

and the insula (an area involved with feeling empathy and
compassion for others). The vast majority of people with porn
addictions have Internet addictions.

4. One study showed that even moderate porn use correlated with
having reduced gray matter. Though it did not conclusively show that
porn had caused the reduction, the study led researchers to conclude
that porn use was the most likely explanation. They even subtitled
their study “The Brain on Porn”. The study also found a correction
between the length of time spent watching porn and the amount of
gray matter reduction in the brain’s reward circuitry, which is
important in motivation and decision-making. This reduction is also
indicative of having a numbed pleasure response. The researchers
interpreted the reduction as an effect of porn use.

5. Addiction researchers have found that brain problems seen in

Internet addicts, similar to the problems seen among porn users,
improved with abstinence and treatment, indicating that the
addiction was the problem, not a preexisting condition.
6. Almost every study on addiction has demonstrated atrophy of
multiple areas of the brain, particularly those associated with frontal
volitional control and reward salience centers. This is true for
addictions to drugs such as cocaine, methamphetamine, and opioids,
and also for behavioral conditions associated with pathologic
overconsumption of food,10 sex,11 and the Internet.1
7. The journal NeuroImage published a study in 2008 demonstrating
that as men are sexually aroused by pornography, the mirror
neurons in the brain also fire. This means that the brain

naturally imagines the porn viewer in the scene. The man is not
merely responding to the naked woman. His brain is mirroring the
pornographic scene with the viewer as the main character,
heightening arousal.
8. When a person continually strengthens the brain maps linking
sexual excitement to porn, those maps enlarge and can crowd out
maps linking sexual excitement to a real person or to real sex.
9. In 2005, Dr. Eric Nestler wrote a landmark paper describing
addiction as a dysfunction of the reward centers of the brain.
Addiction occurs, he explained, when pleasure-reward pathways are
hijacked by certain euphoria-inducing activities, such as eating,
taking drugs, or having sex.

Porn and Emotional Health

Studies have found that frequency of porn use correlates with

depression, anxiety, stress, and social problems.16 It shouldn’t be
surprising that porn use is associated with depression, given that
porn has the ability to mess with the user’s dopamine system.17
Research has found that dopamine signaling is a main factor in
depression.
2. Dopamine significantly affects our motivation to pursue goals and
build relationships, so when the brain can’t feel dopamine’s effects as
well, our interest in doing those things can start to slide.

3. Studies have found that porn use is correlated with having less
sexual and relationship satisfaction and changed sexual tastes.20

Studies have found that porn use is correlated with lowered quality
of life and poorer health.
5. Studies have found that porn use is correlated with intimacy
problems.
6. Researchers at Oxford University found that moderate to severe
Internet addiction is associated with increased risk of harming
oneself.
7. Even moderate porn use is correlated with damage to parts of the
brain involved with motivation and decision-making.
8. Researchers have also found that moderate porn use is correlated
with shrunken gray matter in parts of the brain that oversee
cognitive function.












A study that looked at Internet addicts (pornography was a main
online activity for the subjects) found that they suffered from
“negative moods” when they went offline.
10. Researchers in Belgium looked at fourteen-year-old boys’
academic performance twice and compared the two scores. They
found that “an increased use of Internet pornography decreased
boys’ academic performance six months later.”

Porn and Sexual Tastes

1. Studies have found that porn use is correlated with less sexual and
relationship satisfaction and changed sexual tastes.
2. Sexual interests are conditionable—we can train them, as Pavlov
trained a dog to salivate when it heard a bell.
3. The brain’s reward center doesn’t know the difference between
“porn

that’s ‘acceptable’ to use” and “porn that’s not cool”. All it knows is
that it likes dopamine. So, when something sick or disturbing pops
up and is linked with sexual arousal, the brain stores the
connection.“Neurons that fire together wire together, and feeling
pleasure in the presence of [something normally unappealing] causes
it to get wired into the brain as a source of delight.”
4. As a porn user builds up tolerance “the pleasure of sexual
discharge must be supplemented with the pleasure of an aggressive
release, and sexual and aggressive images are increasingly mingled—
hence the increase in sadomasochistic themes in hardcore porn.”
5. Researchers have found that women become less sexually aroused
by repeated viewing of the same porn, but become aroused again
when novel porn is introduced.

6. In a 2012 NoFap poll of users, more than half of the respondents

agreed with the statement “My tastes became increasingly ‘extreme’
or ‘deviant’.”
7. In a study, researchers found that when male subjects saw the
same porn film repeatedly, they were progressively less aroused by
it. When researchers introduced a new video after eighteen viewings
of the old one, subjects’ arousal spiked.
8. When a person uses porn, his brain wires together what is seen
with the feelings of arousal it creates, building new brain maps for
both what he thinks is sexy and what he expects from his partner.
9. Researchers have found that the younger the age of first porn use,
the more likely a porn consumer is to use bestiality or child porn

Porn and Sexual Violence

1. In a meta-analysis of forty-six studies published from 1962 to

1995, comprising a total sample of 12,323 people, researchers
concluded that pornographic material puts one at increased risk of
the following:
• developing sexually deviant tendencies (31 percent increase in
risk)
• committing sexual offenses (22 percent increase in risk)
• accepting rape myths (31 percent increase in risk)
2. A study that both exposed participants to pornography and asked
them about their pornography use found that high pornography use
corresponds to higher acceptance of rape myth, acceptance of
violence against women, adversarial sex beliefs, likelihood of
committing rape and forced sex acts, and sexual callousness.

High-use viewers who were exposed to nonviolent, dehumanizing

pornography had higher scores in reported likelihood of committing
rape, sexual callousness, and sexually aggressive behaviors than
high-use viewers who weren’t shown pornography as part of the
study.
3. “A man may learn that there isn’t any need to pay attention to a
woman who is resisting, crying, screaming, struggling, or saying no,
because ultimately she wants it and will enjoy it. He can conclude
that her resistance is a sham and is part of a sex dance that leads to
orgasm. He may assume that even her resistance is sexy and sexually
arousing because it is part of the sexual template.”







 While every type of pornography (including softcore, hard-core,
violent, and rape) is correlated with using verbal coercion, drugs, and
alcohol to coerce women into sexual activity,41 the increase in
attitudes supportive of sexual violence is greater following exposure
to violent porn than it is following exposure to nonviolent porn.”

5. A study that examined sexual violence found that all pornography

types (soft-core, hard-core, violent, and rape) are correlated with
using verbal coercion, drugs, and alcohol to coerce women sexually.
All pornography types, including soft-core, are correlated with the
future likelihood of raping a woman. All pornography other than
soft-core are correlated with actual rape. Those who had higher past
exposure to violent pornography were six times more likely to report
having raped someone compared with those who reported low past
exposure to pornography.

6. The correlations between circulation rates for Play boy, Penthouse,

Chic, Club, Forum, Gallery, Genesis, and Oui and rape rates show that
states with higher rates of circulation had higher rates of rape.
7. “A survey of 313 college students indicated that exposure to men’s
magazines was significantly associated with lower intentions to seek
sexual consent and lower intentions to adhere to decisions about
sexual consent.”
8. Researchers have found that the more frequently men used
pornography and the more violent it was, the more likely they were
to coerce others into sex, including using physical force (rape).

According to a study of domestic violence victims, battery cases

include sexual violence when pornography is involved. “The batterer’s
use of pornography and alcohol significantly increases a battered
woman’s odds of being sexually abused. Pornography alone
increases the odds of sexual violence by a factor of almost two.”
Forty percent of abused women indicated that their partner used
violent pornography. Of those whose partners used pornography, 53
percent said that they had been asked or forced to enact scenes they
had been shown, and 26 percent had been reminded of pornography
by an abuser during the abuse. Of the 40 percent who had been
raped, 73 percent said that their partners had used pornography.

10. Pornography has been shown to have a role in rape cases. In one
study, in 193 cases of rape, 24 percent of the rapists mentioned
allusions to pornographic material. This is even more significant
because these comments were made by respondents without any
solicitation or reference to the issue of pornography by the
interviewer. The comments followed the same pattern: the assailant
referred to pornographic materials he had seen or read and then
insisted that the victims not only enjoyed rape but also extreme
violence.

Porn and Erectile Dysfunction

1. “It’s hard to know exactly how many young men are suffering
from porn-induced ED. But it’s clear that this is a new phenomenon,
and it’s not rare.”

2. “I can tell how much porn a man watches as soon as he starts

talking candidly about any sexual dysfunction he has. . . . A man
who masturbates frequently can soon develop erection problems
when he’s with his partner. Add porn to the mix, and he can become
unable to have sex. . . . A penis that has grown accustomed to a
particular kind of sensation leading to rapid ejaculation will not
work the same way when it’s aroused differently. Orgasm is delayed
or doesn’t happen at all.”

3. “It starts with lower reactions to porn sites. Then there is a general
drop in libido, and in the end it becomes impossible to get an
erection.”

4. In Italy, research that looked at porn and its impact on sexual

problems in men ages 19 to 25 found that on a scale ranking sexual
desire from 1 to 10 (10 being the highest), porn users averaged a
score of 4.21, while nonusers came in at 8.02. Erectile function was
also 30 percent lower among porn users compared with nonusers,
and
those on porn also earned lower scores on overall sexual satisfaction
and orgasm function.

5. A study done at Cambridge University that looked at men with

porn addiction found that more than half of the subjects reported
that “as a result of excessive use of sexually explicit materials, they
had. . . experienced diminished libido or erectile function specifically
in physical relationships with women (although not in relationship to
the sexually explicit material).”

6. “Pills [such as Viagra] will do something physiologic. They can

provide blood flow to the genitalia. But what they can’t do is
stimulate the most sexual organ, which is the brain. So when the
brain is desensitized, you create a mismatch. And some men will even
say, ‘Well I do get an erection’ even in these men who are able to be

treated. Even with that erection, they do feel desensitized. They don’t
get pleasure. So it doesn’t treat the pleasure component, and they
feel that maybe I’m watching someone else having sex or it’s not
even my penis; I feel dissociated from the experience. And when they
have that they have this brain-penis mismatch created where the
brain is simply not feeling pleasure even if they may or may not
achieve an erection.”

7. Researchers have found that even moderate porn use was

correlated with having a lowered response to sexual cues in the
brain. Although the research didn’t conclusively show that porn had
caused the changes, that was the theory the researchers found most
likely. They even subtitled their study “The Brain on Porn”.

8. When a person is continuously strengthening the brain maps

linking
sexual excitement to porn, those maps enlarge and can crowd out
maps linking sexual excitement to a real person or to real sex.56
9. Researchers in Italy took brain scans of men with ED for which
there was no obvious physical cause. They found that their brains
showed reduced gray matter in the reward center (which means
reduced dopamine signaling) and the sexual centers of the
hypothalamus.57 Porn is associated with having reduced gray
matter.

10. Doctors and past porn users have found that leaving porn behind
can fix erectile-dysfunction problems.

Porn and Marriage

1. Frequent exposure to porn is associated with diminished trust in

intimate partners; increased risk of
developing a negative body image, especially for women; acceptance
of promiscuity as a normal state of interaction; beginning to view
love in a cynical manner; belief that superior sexual satisfaction is
attainable without having affection for one’s partner; belief that
marriage is sexually confining; and belief that raising children and
having a family is an unattractive prospect.

2. “To add insult to injury, many wives are directly or indirectly

blamed for their husband’s pornography use by her spouse, family,
or confidant. Many women I have worked with clinically describe
stinging insinuations that the marriage must be unsatisfying, that
she has ‘let herself go’ and is no longer as physically attractive as
she once was, that she is closed-minded to new sexual experiences,
or that she is overly focused on her children and not attending to her
husband’s needs.

Too often the woman’s experience of the marital relationship and the
historical context of his pornography habit become conveniently
dismissed as irrelevant by those seeking to assign blame to her.”
3. Among attorneys at the November 2002 meeting of the American
Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers, 62 percent said the Internet had
been a significant factor in divorces they had handled during that
year. Of those cases, 56 percent involved one person having an
obsessive interest in Internet porn.

4. In a study of wives of sex addicts for whom pornography use was

an issue in their relationship with their spouses, 68.18 percent had
experienced a form of isolation (emotional, spiritual, physical, or
social) during the course of dealing with the problem.63 “What was
interesting was that many

of the women reported having strong networks of support and

family ties, but still described being isolated due to the shameful
nature of this particular problem. This suggests women who are
high-functioning and well-supported in other areas of life may still
be at risk for isolation, delayed help-seeking behavior, and/or
prolonged psychological struggle because the problem is so shaming
and public awareness of it is in its infancy. In addition, isolation can
put women at risk for heightened psychological stress and turmoil if
they are used to receiving support in other areas of life, thereby
making this population more vulnerable overall.”

5. Many women who learn of a partner’s compulsive pornography

use or other sexual addictions experience psychological effects, such
as fatigue, changes

in appetite and libido, and other signs of anxiety and depression,

such as suicidal tendencies.
6. A study that looked at how couples were impacted by cybersex
addiction found cybersex addiction to be a major contributing factor
to separation and divorce among affected couples. While several
online sexual activities were listed in the study, pornography use was
involved in every case.

7. A study of 100 women who were or had been in relationships with

male pornography users found that women in married relationships
commonly view Internet pornography consumption as a substantial
threat to the marriage. Their distress increased according to how
frequent they believed their husband’s online sexual activities were,
and their feelings were not significantly influenced by religious beliefs
Marriages in which one partner has a pornography problem or
sexual compulsion are commonly plagued by problems with
diminished intimacy and sensitivity, anxiety, secrecy, isolation,
relationship dysfunction, and decreased financial security due to the
risk of job loss or related debts.

9. Adult exposure to pornography is associated with greater

acceptance of having affairs for married individuals.69
10. In a study that examined marital rape, research found that there
was a correlation between pornography use and the most sadistic
marital rapes.

Porn and Adolescence

1. Adolescents report that pornography influences adolescent sexual

behavior
It’s easier for someone to recover from having his sexual tastes
altered when those altered tastes were acquired as an adult than it is
for someone who acquired problematic sexual tastes during his
critical periods of development in youth and adolescence.

3. A study of Greek youth found that adolescents exposed to

pornography may develop “unrealistic attitudes about sex and
misleading attitudes toward relationships”.
4. Five studies conducted on Swedish youth found that young men
who regularly consume pornography are more likely to have had
anal intercourse with a girl and to have tried acts seen in
pornography, and that girls who have seen pornography are more
likely to have had anal sex. Most of the young women in the studies
did not enjoy anal intercourse and did not want to do it again.

A study that looked at middle-school youth found that exposure to

pornography predicted perpetration of sexual harassment in boys,
more permissive sexual norms, engaging in oral sex, and engaging in
intercourse in high school.
6. Longitudinal studies have linked heavy exposure to sexual
mainstream media with earlier sexual activity, earlier coital behavior,
and increased risk for unplanned pregnancy78 and sexually
transmitted disease.
7. A 2014 study in Australia conducted by the Burnet Institute’s
Centre for Population Health found that weekly porn use was
significantly associated with early sexual behavior, inconsistent
condom use, sexting, and anal sex.

8. “Not only younger children, but even young teenagers are

generally not sophisticated enough to differentiate between fantasy
and reality. They learn direct lessons from pornography, with no
filter, and with no concept of exaggeration, irony, or affect. They
learn what women supposedly look like, how they should act, and
what they are supposed to do. They learn what women ‘want’ and
how men can give it to them. Watching pornography, boys and girls
learn that women always want sex and that sex is divorced from
relationships. They learn that men can have whomever they want
and that women will respond the way men want them to. They learn
that anal sex is the norm and instant female orgasm is to be
expected. And they absorb these lessons avidly, emulating people
they perceive to be role models.”

9. “It’s sad that boys who are initiated to sex through these images
become indoctrinated in a way that can potentially stay with them
for the rest of their lives. . . . Boys learn that you have sex in spite of
your feelings, not because of your feelings. Meanwhile, girls are
taught that you don’t have intimacy without relationships.”
10. “Porn shuts down a boy’s natural feeling, as it places little value
on intimacy, empathy or respect of partners in pornographic
material. A growing body of research also shows that viewing porn is
likely to make boys more sexually aggressive, to do whatever they
feel they can get away with, and to want to act out what they have
seen.”





Chapter 6 - Mind Fucked

The most fucked up thing is watching all day.... all night
and hiding behind the lines...
...

Hiding from society and all day masturbating...!

Publication Date: May 3rd 2018

https://www.bookrix.com/-amd935e35df1e85